Newsgroups: sci.space.shuttle
Path: utzoo!henry
From: henry@utzoo.uucp (Henry Spencer)
Subject: Re: INTERESTED IN REVIEWS OF CHALLENGER
Message-ID: <1990Feb27.035238.9294@utzoo.uucp>
Organization: U of Toronto Zoology
References: <18626.25e9591a@merrimack.edu>
Date: Tue, 27 Feb 90 03:52:38 GMT

In article <18626.25e9591a@merrimack.edu> ain149e1@merrimack.edu writes:
>... I BELIEVE (PERSONALLY) THAT THE ASTRONAUTS SURVIVED THE BLAST, BUT
>DROWN WHEN THE SHUTTLE HIT THE WATER.

No, actually, they were killed by the impact when the cabin hit the water.
They were *probably* unconscious from hypoxia, although that is not certain.
It is virtually certain that they were neither killed nor fatally injured
by the breakup itself.  (Technically there was no "blast"; the shuttle did
not explode, it disintegrated.)

(This isn't just personal opinion, it's what the NASA medical/forensic
report concluded.)
-- 
"The N in NFS stands for Not, |     Henry Spencer at U of Toronto Zoology
or Need, or perhaps Nightmare"| uunet!attcan!utzoo!henry henry@zoo.toronto.edu