> From: Robert Seeberger [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED]]
> You are the second to posit that explanation, but I dont > think it is very > good actually. There are literally thousands of pieces on the > ground only > some of which have that burnt/scorched look. It looks to me > as if there was > a significant explosion during the descent that broke the > ship into pieces. As I learned just last night by finally looking at the link posted here a while back about the "top 5 cosmic myths" it's not air friction that heats up the shuttle. It is air compression. So it isn't surprising that the pieces wouldn't have been scorched. > The shuttle is designed to withstand the stresses of reentry. > I would expect > the airframe to withstand most damage even after losing a > wing. Remember > that the wings are behind the center of the shuttle. Most of > the damage > would be concentrated aft, and the forward sections would > still be protected > by heat tiles. The shuttle *is* designed to withstand the stresses of reentry but only within normal parameters. As soon as it started breaking apart, it would have started tumbling. At that point the whole thing must have disintegrated at those speeds. Plus, it's still early and Texas is a BIG place. There could be bigger pieces that hit the ground that haven't been discovered yet. And if they were in fairly remote areas and included corpses, we might not have heard about them yet on the news... - jmh _______________________________________________ http://www.mccmedia.com/mailman/listinfo/brin-l
