To: stomper who wrote (42801 ) 2/1/2003 10:36:31 AM From: Lee Lichterman III Read Replies (1) | Respond to Yes, I am watching right now and it is a very sad moment. When you realize the science that goes into these missions, a re-entry error of a portion of a degree makes a huge difference on the heat disipation and stresses on the control surfaces. pitch the nose up or down slightly out of the envelope and bad things happen. Also there are tons of hits while they are out in space from minute space debris both natural in the form of space dust, mini meteors/asteroids and then our own space junk. There is so much stuff out there we can't even track it all and only shoot for the larger pieces. Much of this debris is moving 10s of thousands of miles an hour and is like AAA fire and can weaken or put holes in critical parts.
