Well, this is a pretty good setback for NASA — after all that work, the external fuel tank once again shed a great big piece of foam, very nearly as big as the one that doomed the Columbia.
So, the fleet — such as it is — is grounded again.
Next comes a long period of trying to fix the problem again… which is difficult, because it seems to be a fundamental flaw in the design of the entire system.
I wonder if some muckety-mucks are even now discussing the option of Atlantis bringing back the station astronauts, and just scrapping the shuttle and the ISS altogether?
