NASA announced on Thursday that it would not repair a torn
thermal blanket near the commander's window on the space shuttle
Discovery, which will return to Earth next week.
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"We have cleared Discovery to reenter and have decided not to take
any action on the thermal blanket because we think it represents
negligible concern at this time," deputy shuttle program manager
Wayne Hale told a press conference at the space center in
Houston.
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According to Hale, the decision was made after days of analysis
concluded the risk of serious damage to the shuttle on reentry from
the torn blanket breaking off and hitting the shuttle was
"remote."
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If the repair was necessary, Discovery's astronauts would have to
conduct a fourth and unplanned spacewalk. On Wednesday, one
spacewalker completed an unprecedented repair to fill gaps in two
areas of protruding heat protective tiles.
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The shuttle is scheduled to land at the Kennedy Space Center in
Florida early on Monday after a 13-day mission, the first shuttle
flight since the 2003 Columbia space shuttle disaster.
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The US space agency hopes no heat protection problem would occur,
leading to a repeat of the Columbia accident. The tragedy, in which
the seven astronauts were killed, was blamed on a big chunk of
insulation foam breaking off the external fuel tank and harming the
shuttle wing on liftoff.
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Hale said NASA cannot be 100 percent confident about a zero risk
during reentry, but "we've assessed this risk to the very best of
our engineering knowledge and we believe that it is remote, small,
whatever adjective you want to put with that."
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(Xinhua News Agency August 5, 2005)