[Uncle George]

I posted here two days after the shuttle breakup that the left tire exploded and blew the wing off so we freepers are pretty good detectives also.

[USNBandit]

I don't know about the shuttle, but most aircraft tires have "thermal plugs" which melt when the tires get too hot. Usually this occurs is a brake locks or the brakes have to be used too much during a high speed abort or landing on a short runway. The idea is that at a critical temp. the thermal plugs will melt releasing the high pressure air and avoiding a catostrophic failure. When the public transcripts stated the tire pressure on the left mainmounts went to zero, I would assume this meant a slow release of the air pressure.

[isthisnickcool]

I posted here two days after the shuttle breakup that the left tire exploded and blew the wing off so we freepers are pretty good detectives also.

I was posting some things too. See #6