to what I said: “They are dismissing the most obvious suspect out of hand,…”
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I can’t believe I have to go though grammar lessons for you to see the meaning of the word “dismissing”, which I intentionally and carefully selected.
There is only a little difference in the spelling between “dismissing” and “dismissed” but there is a huge difference in meaning.
I didn't use the past tense "dismissed" as you inferred (Neither did I say that anything was “completely” done on the matter of dismissing the foam, or I would have used the word “dismissed”).
“Dismissing” = present participle completing the present progressive verb “are Dismissing”. Present participles complete progressive verbs. The progressive verb in this case is "are dismissing".
The word “dismissing” refers to a present process by NASA. If I intended to say it was "completely ruled out" as you thought I meant, I would have said "dismissed".
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Typically, there are a few steps when an attempt is made to execute the unwarranted dismissing process in an accident investigation such as this for the foam.
Step 1) Cast doubts about the subject of foam. (done - February 5th, 2003)
Step 2) Based only on the unwarranted doubts cast by these self-serving "experts", you make heavy cuts into the money and effort earmarked for foam investigation in the failure analysis.
Step 3) With limited funds directed at foam investigation, have low level personnel perform only rudimentary tests, write non-consequential reports, and cite "no-prior evidence" on the subject.
Step 4) In the final report, announce that: “In our investigations on foam, we found no evidence to support the theory that foam was the primary cause of failure."
Step 5) Infer the conclusion: "...therefore NASA management was not in any way responsible for the loss of vehicle."
When I did failure analysis, there were people who would do almost the same thing NASA officials are attempting (the progressive verb) now before they were taken to the mat for substantiation.
For the record, this is the third of three definitions of the word DISMISS as given by Webster's dictionary: (bold print added by me)
3 a : to reject serious consideration of b : to put out of judicial consideration
Maybe DISMISS has a different, specialized meaning in your line of work, but I'd interpret your statement that “They are dismissing the most obvious suspect out of hand,…” to mean exactly the same thing as the phrase "They are not seriously considering the most obvious suspect...".
All I'm saying is that NASA is considering other possibilities along with the foam insulation strike, and that their calculations so far have suggested that the foam insulation could not have caused "loss of vehicle", as NASA describes the event. Eventually, perhaps, NASA will be able to reconcile the chain of events that destroyed the shuttle with a wing strike during launch. But until they can do so, the only responsible course of action is to consider any and all possibilities. You seem to be suggesting that NASA should say "Hey, we have videotape of this foam insulation striking the wing, and despite the fact that we can't predict a damage level remotely close to that required to cause breakup of the shuttle during re-entry, we should just pin the blame on that and move on." I certainly hope that's not standard practice in the failure analysis game.
NASA has nothing to gain by covering up the true cause of the disaster (even if it was the foam insulation) because they will be blamed (wrongly, I might add) by the public regardless of the true cause. Unless and until the space program is given an unlimited budget, there will always be a certain level of risk associated with space exploration, and things like this will unfortunately happen from time to time.
NASA engineers and the independent panel investigating the Columbia accident will run through a range of possible causes, but that 2.6-pound chunk of foam that dislodged from the tank and struck Columbia's left wing 81 seconds into flight remains an obvious suspect. Even if it turns out not to be the "root cause," the accident has already forced NASA managers to reassess the blanket dismissal of insulation as a potential hazard.
Looks like I'm a minority of one regarding the relevance of "dismiss" regarding this investigation, though that article seems to be referring to NASA's opinion of insulation as a general hazard as opposed to a cause of this particular event.