[Gracey]

I was confused about the tire pressures. If I understood correctly, they showed an increase, then went offscale low.

You must have worked at KSC Shuttle Ops turnaround. Would the tire pressure increase reentry heat from damaged leading edge tile, and then just blow (indicating no pressure)? That Columbia was full of instrumentation. I used to sit in on Shuttle change board meetings regarding same.

[Bronco_Buster_FweetHyagh]

Bottom line is this:

The shuttle was damaged on lift-off. They "analyzed" that, without visual confirmation, and determined it was not a problem.

They made ZERO effort to get a visual inspection after that. No space walk to examine the ship. No telescopes used. No satellites used. No cameras/telescopes from orbit (space station, hubble, etc) used either. They did absolutely NOTHING after making that initial uneducated evaluation.

That was a HUGE mistake. And, in the press conference, the NASA program director gave it all away with his response:

QUESTION: Did NASA consider a spacewalk to examine the damage?

ANSWER: We don't have the ability to repair tiles in space.

That did NOT answer the question. Who cares if that shuttle could have repaired the tiles? The should have at least inspected to see if there was a problem.

IF they had inspected, and found the problem, then contingency plans could have been made:

1) Stay in orbit as long as possible.
2) Download all shuttle data, all expierment data, and give the crew time to say personal goodbyes, letters, emails, radio calls, etc.
3) Analyze contingency plans such as launching another shuttle to rescue them, launching another shuttle to repair the damage, spacewalking to repair the damage if possible, docking with space station to wait out rescue/repair, or simply taking as long as possible before attempting re-entry or simply dieing in orbit.

NASA made a huge mistake. And the program director's evasive non-responsive answer betrayed his feelings of guild and responsibility.