[Poohbah]

Of course. NASA's failure to anticipate the severity of the damage is quite damning.

No, it isn't. That's not the biggest chunk of anything to ever hit the Shuttle during climbout.

My proposal is therefore predicated on NASA erring on the side of caution instead of throwing it to the wind.

And speeding Atlantis through preflight by getting rid of a bunch of safety checks, and putting TWO shuttles and NINE astronauts at risk is "erring on the side of caution."

Georgie Orwell would be so proud of you!

[KantianBurke]

No need to take this all so personally. No one has accused YOU of complicity in neglience or murder. This is all theoretical but useful. If problems are not correctly identified and solved, they will only reappear.

While you have a point regarding the Atlantis emergency launch, it therefore begs the question if NASA considered such a launch impractical what WERE their other options in this situation? Or were they content to simply cross fingers? They should have taken a page out of the Boy Scouts motto: Be Prepared.