[diamondgeezer]

Just been listening to CNN playing the last momenst of radio chatter... the shuttle's messages just cut off... nasty, nasty experience

[MiG]

Here from Juarez, Chihuahua, i live in the frontier with El Paso, TX and i live 2 or 3 hours of some of the counties in Texas, near Lubbock, here at this moment we don't have any information of someone here saw the Shuttle at the moment of the explosion, if i have some information about someone see the shuttle i inform here. (because the Columbia explodes above 203 000 feet probably someone here or in El Paso see something).

[Ace]

On the bright side, despite what occurs in the US space program, the Chinese one is still on track. In a few years, it may be a wake up call.

[Whitelight]

I see the shock of this inccident is beginning to wear off, it is regreatable that this could happen, but it was bound to happen sooner or later... The more missions flown the greater the risk, like russian roulette, eventually the chamber with the bullet will come around and bang.......

Life is full of unexpected twist and turns, and this one is no exception...

[MiG]

Also someone knows anything about the Lockheed Martin X33?

[IceFire]

Originally posted by TheVirtu
I read up on something, the shuttle was the oldest shuttle NASA has...20 years old...28 missions...now...isnt that a bit old? I would have decomissioned it.

I'm 20 years old...you want to decomission me?

Stuff lasts longer than 5 years.  Sometimes we forget because we live in the wonderful world of computers where months equals obselencence instead of years.  The US used WWII battleships that were designed in the 1930's in the 1991 Gulf War.  B-52 bombers were designed in the 1960's and are expected to be used until 2040.  Most of the originals are decom sure, but there aren't any new airframes around so they are old too.  More than 20 years old for sure.

From the indications right now, this is not the end of the shuttle program.  I bet there will be a significant delay until they find out what happened.  If its like anything else, it will be a serious of events or errors or mistakes or circumstances that lead to this tragedy.  It may lead to design changes in the new shuttles that are being developed or it may not...too early to tell.

[Galemp]

I just woke up, and...

OH MY GOD!

This is so sad....

[Eishtmo]

Well ****.  Why is it that someone will come banging on my door telling me about a couple stupid buildings being knocked over and they don't do anything when something important happens?

I remember Challenger, I was sitting in class when aonther teacher came in announcing it.  The rest of the day was spent watching TV, even during lunch.  That was funny because someone yelled at the entire caffeteria for being noisy "We're showing this to you, can't you be respectful" or something like that.  How many caffeterias have you been that have been quiet for any reason?

Colombia and Challenger.  Well that does it folks, no more shuttle names starting with the letter C.  I have declared it.

[vyper]

Originally posted by MiG
Also someone knows anything about the Lockheed Martin X33?

Yes: IMHO It should be in service but isn't.

[ZylonBane]

Originally posted by Eishtmo
Why is it that someone will come banging on my door telling me about a couple stupid buildings being knocked over and they don't do anything when something important happens?

Nice flamebait.

[CP5670]

Actually, I also do think that this is more important than the 9/11 due to the implications it will have on the space program.

[daveb]

Originally posted by Eishtmo
Well ****.  Why is it that someone will come banging on my door telling me about a couple stupid buildings being knocked over and they don't do anything when something important happens?

Ugh. I've had about enough of this board. The combination of rampant anti-Americanism, and ridiculous insensitivity is outrageous.

I am gone.

[beatspete]

Planes crash.  Space planes are going to crash too.  Its all very well saying how tragic it its, and i dont deny its not, but people die all the time, and the astronauts knew the risks.  
Hopefully something positive will come from this, ie more investment in reusable launch vehicles, and preferably not just from NASA.

[Ace]

Originally posted by daveb


Ugh. I've had about enough of this board. The combination of rampant anti-Americanism, and ridiculous insensitivity is outrageous.

I am gone.

It is sad though that a half-rational arguement could be created about how the death of seven people is more important than the death of thousands.

However, as has been stated here many times before, the astronauts knew the risk, and sadly it occured.

[wEvil]

Originally posted by IceFire

I'm 20 years old...you want to decomission me?

Well, if you really want me to

The only day we'll have safe space travel is when you get orbital towers built, in my opinion.

Using reentry modules is a pretty fallible technique, but considering how fragmented we are as a species its currently impossible to marshall the resources needed to do consider any alternatives.

Oh well.....a few big rocks from space and it wont matter - thats where dumb nationalism got us

[Starfury]

Originally posted by TheVirtu
I read up on something, the shuttle was the oldest shuttle NASA has...20 years old...28 missions...now...isnt that a bit old? I would have decomissioned it.

No, the shuttles are aged based on missions, not actual years, evidently.  And the minimum operational life of each shuttle was intended to be 100 missions...  ( I've been listening to the radio news covering this locally for the last four hours, so I've picked up a few things here and there. )

[Stryke 9]

Eish, you can not care or think that all the expressions of horror at death this remote sound stilted, but going out of your way to be nasty about it- I mean, what, you resent these guys or something? The **** they do to you?

Personally, I don't think it's possible to really comprehend completely an event so remote as one televised, to genuinely feel for these people who are only a couple levels of reality up from the ones you enjoy watching get blown up in movies to you, but I think it's pretty low to trivialize it like they really are of no more significance than those.

[Solatar]

Originally posted by daveb


Ugh. I've had about enough of this board. The combination of rampant anti-Americanism, and ridiculous insensitivity is outrageous.

I am gone.

I hope he's coming back...

[Zeronet]

The insensitivity on this board is making me angry, people die and all people on this board can go on about, is how they dont like the US. Im relatively desensitised emotionally, but its still upsetting to hear about something like this, while others evidently on this board couldnt care less.

[Solatar]

Well spoekn Zeronet.

I do agree that everybody's making too big a fuss about seven people dying, what about the other thousands that died today?

But whenever something bad happens, for some reason everybody just says they hate the US. Maybe we should just site back, stop giving military support, watch communism take over, stop giving food to poor countries, watch everybody starve, and stop exploring space for the good of mankind.

A wiseman (Can't remember who) once said that Earth is Humankind's cradle, but we cannot live in a cradle forever.