The Questions Get Tougher

Nasa Draws Fire From Investigators for Its "Flawed" Shuttle Decision

The painstaking search for the cause of the world's worst space disaster shifted dramatically, and distressingly, in tone last week. After 24 successful space-shuttle flights, the explosion of Challenger and the loss of its seven crew members had been widely viewed as a tragic but virtually inevitable cost of pioneering on the high frontier of space. As it one day must, so it was said, ill fortune had finally overtaken the methodical, ever cautious, technological wizards of the National Aeronautics and Space Administration. Declared President Reagan on that fateful day: "It's all part of the process of exploration and discovery; it's...

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