[Ramtek57]

Ok, maybe they couldn't haved docked with the space station. They could have parked by it and have one of the space staion guys to float over to them and get them.

[Bronco_Buster_FweetHyagh]

People are totally missing the point.

This is not about whether or not they could have recovered from their descent. This is not about whether or not they could have docked at the space station.

This is about one simple thing - why didn't Nasa make a visual confirmation that the during-launch insulation impact did not cause serious damage?

The program director was asked if Nasa had considered a spacewalk to examine the damage. He did not answer the question directly. Intead, he said "we cannot walk outside the shuttle and REPAIR TILES".

Wouldn't you think that they would at least want to know if the damage was bad or not? Doesn't make sense. Who cares if they couldn't fix it? You wouldn't just roll the dice and try to re-enter orbit. You would wait as long as possible before running out of water/food/air, and exhausting all potential rescue mission scenarios.

[steveegg]

Unfortunately, orbital mechanics aren't exactly like moving around a flat earth. It takes a certain velocity to reach the altitude of the ISS, which Columbia was incapable of attaining because of its weight-to-thrust ratio.

[Jonah Hex]

I'll take a shot at this.

The ISS and Columbia are on different orbital inclinations relative to the Earth's equator. The ISS orbit ranges further north and south than the normal shuttle orbit. To shift Columbia's orbital inclination to match the ISS would require an enormous amount of delta-v, more than the shuttle's OMS fuel supply can support. Try as they might, they never could have matched orbit with the ISS.

Why are the oribital inclinations different? NASA made that decision when Goldin decided to being on the Russians as ISS partners. They needed the greater inclined orbit to support launching modules/crews/supplies with Russian boosters. Not only did this change the ISS-support orbital inclination, it also reduced the available orbiter ISS mission payload since additional fuel is required to reach orbit due to the inclined orbit loses some the advantage of using the Earth's east-west rotation.

Bottom line: Columbia could not have reached the ISS.