Damage eyed as shuttle heads toward space station

Damage eyed as shuttle heads toward space station

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CAPE CANAVERAL, Fla. — Space shuttle Endeavour rocketed toward the international space station Thursday as engineers on Earth pored over launch pictures that showed debris breaking off the fuel tank and striking the craft.

Mission Control told the astronauts late Wednesday that the damage looked less extensive at first glance than what occurred on the last shuttle flight, but it will take days to sort through available data to reach a conclusion.

The astronauts planned a Thursday afternoon inspection of their ship's thermal shielding, using a 100-foot laser-tipped boom. The procedure

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What do you make of this?

Doesn't sound too good....

.... hopefully not too severe as first thoughts suggest. But won't know until more analysis.

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(visit the link for the full news article)



[edit on 16-7-2009 by john124]

i had a bad feeling about the shuttle sitting out that long on the launch pad..
there's bound to be a huge build up of ice on the fuel tank ...
as for minimal damage , even the smallest hole will burn into a larger hole when reentering the atmosphere...





i hope they survive...

[edit on 16-7-2009 by fatdad]

I said earlier that after the many delays that maybe something just doesn't want the shuttle up there. You can't play with fate.