Anni wrote:
Then cannot it be slowed down while in orbit where you would not need a
massive amount of energy to slow it down from 22700mph if done over a few
days which I take it is its approximate speed while in orbit
Could this work?

No, it won't work, because "orbital velocity" is the velocity you need
to stay in orbit. If you slow down, your orbital altitude drops. For a
vehicle like the shuttle, that means the vehicle ends up in the
atmosphere.

And you still would need a lot of fuel to slow down a significant
degree.

Henry Spencer wrote:
It wasn't quite that simple. The original ideas for metallic
thermal protection were complicated,

Hey, hey. No fair blocking my rosy-tinted 20/20 hindsight.

They required very thin layers of exotic metals
that were difficult to work with and tended to be brittle;

Where's the requirement for "very thin" layers come from? Just weight
requirements alone?

Mike Miller, Materials Engineer