Posted on 02/04/2003 3:44:19 PM PST by yonif
"....LOUISIANA:
-Fabric bearing a blue Star of David on a silver background, apparently a uniform patch, found by woman walking in Sabine Parish near Toledo Bend Reservoir.
-Papers, including one that had the name of astronaut William McCool on it and one that had mission number STS107 on it, in a front yard in Vernon Parish.
-What appeared to be a small ring binder in rural Vernon Parish.
etc. etc. -2 ½-foot-by-5-foot chunk of metal in rural Sabine Parish. -Heavy greenish object that appeared to have been circular, about the size of a silver dollar, hit a roof in Pineville and fell into the yard. -Foot-long piece of metal that slammed into a yard in Vernon Parish, partly burying itself and sending up a shower of dirt.
etc etc
For local stories like this, lurk at NE Louisiana sites, like the Shreveport Times
Debris includes Star of David patch, paper with shuttle pilot's name
LEESVILLE, La. (AP) -- What appeared to be a uniform patch emblazoned with a Star of David, a notebook page of technical jargon and a scrap of paper with the name of pilot William McCool are among debris collected in Louisiana during the painstaking search for what's left of space shuttle Columbia.Vernon Parish Sheriff Sam Craft said the papers -- some wrinkled, slightly scorched but otherwise intact, others in scraps -- were found by a woman who thought they were run-of-the-mill litter.
"The woman just looked out in her yard and saw paper on her yard. When she went out to pick it up she found it," Craft said. The papers included a scrap with shuttle pilot McCool's name and another scrap with mission number STS107. He did not identify the woman.
About a mile away, another woman found a sheet of paper that appeared to be from a small ring binder. Kim Magee, 36, of rural Vernon Parish, said her mother found the paper while walking in her yard.
Family members contacted NASA and a man there said they wanted to see it, Magee said.
"We just thought it had to be. It had all kinds of technical jargon, acronyms, charts and arrows," Magee said. "We thought it must have had something to do with takeoff after the tanks separated because it said things like `at T-minus something this will happen, at T-minus something that will happen."
These were among numerous pieces of debris at the Vernon Sheriff's Office, stored in see-through evidence bags, awaiting transport by state police to collection centers where it could be authenticated and stored.
Columbia was streaking through the atmosphere on its way to a Saturday morning landing when it broke up over Texas. Seven astronauts aboard included McCool and five other Americans, along with Israel's first astronaut Ilan Ramon.
Fabric bearing a blue Star of David on a silver background was found by a woman walking in Sabine Parish near Toledo Bend Reservoir where parts of the shuttle are believed to have fallen, Craft said. The woman was on her way to Vernon Parish and dropped it off at the Sheriff's Office, he said.
Other debris collected in Vernon Parish includes three large pieces of metal, masses of hair-like strands that appear to be some type of insulation, and pieces of material that Craft said was similar to Kevlar, a synthetic material used to make bulletproof body armor.
The best site for indxed shuttle stories, IMO, is WKMG-TV Orlando
The emblem on the debris is indeed the same as the one on IAF aircraft, e.g.:
I assume Ramon had some memorabilia along for the ride.
For the record, a reporter asked NASA about this photo yesterday at the press conference, and NASA claimed not to have seen it.
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