[537 Votes]

Knowing hindsight is always 20/20

You would think that for $3 billion a year spent on the Shuttle program, NASA could afford a little foresight. Why couldn't NASA have done the same thing that other FReepers are doing now? The seven Columbia crewmembers would still be in orbit, not out of danger, to be sure, but still alive and capable of rescue.

[bonesmccoy]

Your comment is not consistent with engineering fact.

The vehicle was at the end of a two week mission, which is the longest an orbiter is capable of sustaining life in orbit.

Extension of the vehicle's mission for another two weeks would have created a tomb where the crew suffers a slow, lingering death of starvation, deprivation, and asphyxiation.

There was no choice but to bring the crew home.

[First_Salute]

The situation was not as hopeless as some would like you to think. It is possible that the crew and Orbiter could have been rescued; daring to try being the major contribution.

The opposing forces: bureaucratic inertia and other aids to complacency.