Columbia

Here in Spain, one Astrophisycs engineer that worked in NASA installations in Robledo de Chavela (Madrid) and the Apollo project, comment about the accident these matters: * He discard completely any kind of terrorist act * During the startup of mission, TV cameras saw how the cover of the solid combustible go down and impact against one of the wings. In opinion of this specialist, is very possible that some of the ceramic pieces of the wing (very critical and very small) could be damaged. * NASA saw this later in the TV videos and some engineers did an evaluation of the possible damages and its impact in the re-entry in the atmosphere. and conclude that, in appeareance, it would be possible without problems. * Seconds before the explossion, the temperature sensors of the left wing stopped the transmission. This occurs sometimes cause of high temperatures. The speculation is this: the damaged ceramic pieces stop in its effectivity and the hot enter inside the spaceship. Explosion. About the evaluation of the NASA engineers about the possible damage in the eing, and how could be possible that some external covers could be broken in the jump to the space of the ship... Well, it`s a very delicate matter. Would you speak to the astronauts about possible problems in the re-entry of the ship if you would know it ? I must clear: the ceramic pieces can`t be replaced in space (actually), and all the Space Shuttle ships go to the garage after flight to substitute the damaged ceramic pieces, using some special glue to manage it. With this system, is very possible that some covers could suffer cause of the vibrations of the startup, break and go down. With independence of this, my sincere condolences: some of us admire the space career of the USA, consider it an inversion in the future of all the mankind, and some like me consider that Europe should be joining more efforts with the USA that actually in this matter. This is the country that we admire. And some of us would be very happy to see (and even contribute in our own countries with our own taxes) how some of the militar costs would be derived to the space conquest. Greetings Sergio