In May 1988 Ali AbuTaha's Spaceflight Cover article forecast the Columbia Loss.
Personally, I believe Challenger died for a different reason, however, as his calculations showed areas of the vehicle would have pre-existing metal fatigue my own mechanism -- small explosions in the fuel prompted by over-fast5 drying -- would result in tongues of flame emerging, preferentially, just above the struts that transmit the sideways overstrain (vertical strains are all higher by 40% later in flight because "vacuum thrust" is higher and this, plus 10%, was assumed to cancel the transients but a 1981 launch timing change was not a full redesign and missed that sideways stresses have no such extra 40% -- in 1970 they Launched after 1 second of SSME testing not 6.6, so the vehicle never bent all the way over --Ali wanted to change back but a launch partly bent over might jam one of the SRB clamps; the Companies adopted new Requirements for higher structural strength in effect ENDORSING his claims in 1989 -- Congress refused to spend money to change anything but the new AL-Li ET must meet them as it has only half the expected cargo gain) ...
Now image YOU are a Shuttle --orbiter on your back, Solids your arms: the easily seen flame comes out of your wrist about half forward (35 and 37 degrees) hitting the ET just right of the belly button --- but there are two struts, and a flame came out angled BACK about 37 degrees from directly facing the ET, hitting the Right wing Aileron on the underside of the Right wing (note similar damage on both wings on STS-56, -90, and -107, -90 considered Most Similar Mission to -107 as they both had the same weird 1-push Wind Shears) ... now this impact is AT THE SAME MOMENT that Challenger responded to something the Rogers Commission VOTED was a Wind Shear, however, when they finally figured out Wind Shears at the Weather Bureau 2 years later: all such were circular: there should be a Paired Shear in the opposite direction.
There isn't.
Instead, on fetching Challenger pieces from the missile silos out West where they were stored, they found a fist-sized burn through EXACTLY at the point of impact expected from the PICTURES of the flight -- which Ali was able to find for the furious Weather Services (cf Young's tirades against them for killing his friends by not forecasting Challenger's Wind Shear & CHUCK YEAGHER'S BOYCOTT OF THE CHALLENGER MEETINGS AFTER THE COMMISSION ORDERED NASA TO STOP LOOKING AT PARTS OF THE FLIGHT THAT DID NOT ADVANCE THE O-RING THEORY).
Now as Columbia was also launched in a Florida Drought (with SUVs falling into sinkholes) AND just after a Deluge --just like Challenger -- one should expect a similar hole &
so we see the hole in Columbia's elevon actuator -- the Only piece where the new commission did NOT tell reporters "we have to wait for the chemical and other analyses" but dismissed it as occurring AFTER the breakup (Challenger's hole did NOT match other post-breakup heating and anyway from the moment of impact that Ali discovered her motions clearly matched the the way a computer would double-correct for motions with a control surface damaged -- not applicable here).
In short, had Challenger not had a hole directly facing the ET, and so reached orbit (yeah, the ET did not even break up from opposite the "joint that failed" but higher up the side where a welded seam on the Solid obviously busted)....
... its reentry would have seen the wide area around the burn-through, where heating makes the aluminum less stiff, flex the wing resulting in breaks where it adjoints the almost unbendable RCC panels at the front of the wing, ON THE TOP of the wing.
Now the insane parts of the Columbia Scenario are explained: the STRESS sensor goes first because STRESS breaks it, the TOP of the wing loses pieces at 340 seconds changing the airflow (yet all this is "caused" by a breach at 487 seconds over TWO MINUTES later (!)), the wires all die from the TOP down, the farthest west piece is from the TOP of the wing, the carrier panel directly behind and adjoining #8 lower (the foam impact point) is the LEAST damaged piece in that zone of the wing but #8 carrier UPPER is one of the MOST , Carrier Panels #9 Upper #10 upper, #11 upper are all missing but ALL of the Lower carriers were found by the Debris sorters at a time when it was admitted the orbit object HAD to be a carrier panel (after which we get excuses)... etc etc etc.
Ali's strut-transmitted overthrust causes overpressures in the SRBs to squirt out in a hideously dangerous direction. After patches of insulation melted on STS-56 indicating 1000 degrees (despite never exceeding 200 in either models or on a similar inclination flight) -- at 1100 degrees they die -- the other 3 Shuttles had heavier insulation put on (not Columbia) (not on a wide enough area for so severe a heating incident, probably).
I would: (1) not launch between 1 and 30 hours after a rain (2) start 1 engine 8 seconds before the other SSMEs and Launch 1 second later (+800lb cargo) (3) Provide Intact escape off the Solids using an Idle mode (+22,000 pounds with Centaur OMS) (4) Rehire the fired Scientists (why do you think they had to contract for Boeing to look at the Foam Problem?) (The OMB took over NASA recently (Sean "NASA doesn't need any new starts" O'Keefe), just like the NRC in 1985/6: wipe out the good parts, a shuttle blows, convene a panel containing ZERO Rocket Scientists --- and the next time, the SAME mechanism could kill via a fuel leak -- which clearly happens here cf the sensors that failed after FALLING temperatures showing LH2 pooling in the back of the wing, or aero-force breakup early due to the associated MISMATCH of SRB thrusts (STS-25 -107). Consider the Universal Electrical Failure 2 seconds after the epocal restabilization STS-107s Pilots managed 30 seconds after half the left wing broke off -- LH2 explosion in fuel cell area??? -- other wise they live to bail-out altitude (?).
Finally the economy responds to INFRASTRUCTURE -- when Clinton cut NASA's Space Science by a factor of 2.5 in 2 years, 5 years later all (major) new developments in Computer stopped & the Market crashed....
So for goodness sakes keep NASA at at least HALF JFK's level -- it means $220 Billion a year in the 6th year after, 444 the next 650 the next etc. Comments?
from edge-to-edge in order to avoid one tear out event leading to the adjacent hole and so on. After initial failures of these joints (no doubt due to excessive axial force transients) extra 1" bolts were added between each initial one. Now the spacing is 0.25". OSHA, let alone a pressure vessel designer, would jam on the brakes.