NASA Decides on a Shuttle Heat-Shield Fix

NASA experts have been debating a blanket tear in an exposed segment of the space shuttle Atlantis' aluminum skin, located atop the left orbital maneuvering system pod near the shuttle Atlantis's vertical stabilizer. Engineers are focusing their attention on a gap about 4 inches by 6 inches that was discovered after Friday's launch from Kennedy Space Center. Engineers are not sure whether stitching on the blanket came loose or whether the blanket, covering the pod of engines near the shuttle's tail, was hit by External Tank launch debris. "It was a 100 percent consensus that the unknowns of the engineering analysis and the potential damage under the blanket was unacceptable and that we should go in and fix it if we could," said John Shannon, chairman of the mission management team. To avoid damage to the shuttle itself during its re-entry into the atmosphere, NASA managers decided Monday to extend Atlantis' mission to the international space station from 11 to 13 days. This will allow an extra spacewalk for a repair to the thermal blanket. The tear covers a 4-by-6-inch area over an engine pod, and likely will involve an astronaut being attached to the end of the shuttle's robotic arm and the boom reaching out to the shuttle's tail area. The tear can be seen in this image