[freepersup]

As stated in another post- how the shuttle came to be travelling at mach 18 sideways is the six million dollar question.

Not to be insulting by stating the obvious, the shuttle was doomed once it assumed a fatal sideways re-entry position. I just found that fact so compelling when watching the video because it was the first time that I had seen this image captured on film and it was a foregone conclusion as to what would happen next. Granted we already knew the outcome, but to see the final seconds of the shuttle's existence still in a relatively intact configuration, was chilling, to say the least.

Chunking down the thought process to a caption sized comment would be something like-

Super heated shuttle knifes through atmosphere sideways, disintegration follows.

[Thud]

I'd also like to know if Columbia in the 90 yaw before or after loss of contact. Did the two flight crew have time to realize it was in a yaw?

I completely missed the press conference because I was out walking, and my wife watched only part of it. She mentioned that the NASA spokesmen said the shuttle's attitude changes (nose movements up and down from the horizontal vector) were much greater than any seen before, due to minute changes in atmospheric pressure, but didn't recall if NASA had said that was planned in advance or something done spontaneously by the autopilot as it encountered the changes in atmospheric pressure. This may or may not be related to the other problems, but I have no idea how it might be.