[meteorite-list] Columbia disaster

From: David Freeman <dfreeman_at_meteoritecentral.com>
Date: Thu Apr 22 10:18:24 2004
Message-ID: <3E3C3D82.3050007_at_fascination.com>

Dear List;
I too, am very saddened by this mornings events. Watching Buzz Aldrin
read the little one line poem and then choke up was very moving. To
paraphrase (my memory isn't what it used to be) ..."riding a fire ball
to heaven".....a much more glorious way to depart this life than going
by the flu, or in a car accident, or any other mundane and lingering
methods of "slipping the serving bonds of Earth to touch the face of God".
God love us all so much that we all may go out with passion in our
lives, doing what we love and doing what need to be done.
There will be a point when dying of old age, in my sleep is not on my
preferred list of alternatives.
God speed Columbia,
Dave Freeman

Marco Langbroek wrote:

>Dear all,
>
>Maybe it is of -topic, but then, so be it. I, as several other list members
>already posting on the subject, am sad of what happened just a few hours
>ago, and want to express that sadness.
>
>Coming out of our faculty building and redelivering the keys to the guard in
>the main building this afternoon, I was informed of the new tragic disaster
>with space shuttle Columbia. At the guards' desk, I watched tv for a
>moment, showing video footage of a fragmenting fireball. A thought struck
>me, and perhaps some of you on this list experienced the same: I realized
>that normally, such footage of a fragmenting fireball would make me, and all
>of you, wildly enthousiast. Had it just been a meteoric fireball.....
>But not this time. This time, it was not a space rock being deliverd to
>earth, but seven people meeting their death up there. This was the first
>sickening, instead of exciting, fireball video.
>
>Two tragic accidents in about 20 years of space shuttle flying perhaps is
>not much, and almost every month there's a plane crash somewhere which has
>more death involved, and the grimm reality is that we got used to that and
>usually hardly think it over. Yet, somehow, that realization does not
>diminish my feeling that this new space shuttle disaster is something with
>an extremely tragic aspect. Of course, it isn't different, as a plane crash
>is as tragic as a shuttle explosion. Still this new shuttle disaster makes
>me unusually sad and mournfull. My thoughts are with all people affected;
>the astronauts' family, friends, and the people of the space shuttle
>programm.
>
>In answer to Mark Fox: should manned space exploration stop? I don't think
>so. It is inevitable that there will be victims from time to time. It has
>always been part of our human urge for exploration; it is not peculiar to
>space exploration as such. It has always been part of life that people die,
>sometimes too early, sometimes very tragic; it has always been part of life
>that people die when trying to reach a particular goal they set themselves.
>I think the best tribute to those who died, is to continue the effort for
>which they gave their lifes. Otherwise, their death really would have been
>unneccesary. Stopping manned space flight, would mean they died in vain.
>That is my opinion.
>
>- Marco
>
>----------
>Drs Marco Langbroek
>
>marco.langbroek_at_wanadoo.nl
>meteorites_at_dmsweb.org
>http://home.wanadoo.nl/marco.langbroek
>
>"What seest thou else
> In the dark backward and abysm of time?"
>
> William Shakespeare
> The Tempest act I scene 2
>----------
>
>
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>
Received on Sat 01 Feb 2003 04:34:58 PM PST