If the liftoff damage was to blame, the shuttle and its crew of seven may well have been doomed from the very start of the mission.
Dittemore said there was nothing that the astronauts could have done in orbit to fix damaged thermal tiles and nothing that flight controllers could have done to safely bring home a severely scarred shuttle, given the extreme temperatures of re-entry.
Article Explains Repairs Not Possible While in Orbit
101 - "Dittemore said there was nothing that the astronauts could have done in orbit to fix damaged thermal tiles and nothing that flight controllers could have done to safely bring home a severely scarred shuttle, given the extreme temperatures of re-entry. "
I agree. The only thing they could have done was to abort the orbit and land in Spain. And perhaps even that wouldn't have worked. And someone would have needed to do it just a moment after the tank insulation came loose.
And that would have cost $500 million - the average cost of one shuttle launch.