Shortly after Columbia lifted off Jan. 16, a piece of insulating foam on its external fuel tank came off and was believed to have hit the left wing of the shuttle. Leroy Cain, the lead flight director in Mission Control, assured reporters Friday that engineers had concluded that any damage to the wing was considered minor and posed no safety hazard.
From an earlier article on Yahoo News.
1,090 posted on 02/01/2003 8:14:01 AM PST by SamKeck