Dear Haller,

You were recently seen feeding a troll on this thread. If you continue to
do so, it will pollute this thread and it will quickly degrade to nothing
more than a insult shouting match. Please try to refrain yourself by not
responding to trolls who add nothing to the conversation, and by responding
to Jeff who makes a very valid point.

Here Jeff points out that Barbara is in the astronaut corps, she became one
in 1998. She has been waiting to fly for 17 years. She has paid dues, more
dues than most other astronauts. She has been used as a show piece for many
of those years by NASA to promote itself, and probably more effective than
the rest of the astronaut corps combined.

Talking politics, at some time NASA is going to have to pay the piper. Bad
politics would be if NASA puts Barbara Morgan back on the display shelf for
another 17 years, polishing and only taking her off the shelf to parade her
around this countries schools like some PR persons "wet dream" trophy.

For NASA, the decision should be easy, a win-win decision. By allowing
Barbara to fly, she will be a much more valuable spokeswoman, even if she
decides to quit and do her own thing. If she decides to stay and fly again,
she will be even more valuable, as NASA can continue to direct her
activities.

Barbara Morgan, of all people, probably understands the risk better than
anyone. She was selected and served as backup to Christa MaAuliffe, and
watched her die knowing full well she could easily been the one on that
flight instead of Christa. If Christa had caught a common cold she would
have been.

She chose to stay on, and continuing to work for NASA. Some years later,
NASA made it a requirement that she become an astronaut. She became an
astronaut. Finally, she gets assigned to a flight, and the Columbia
Disaster occurs. I haven't heard of her quiting yet.

Personally, I think the next flight of the Shuttle will be one of the
safest. It's the next flight after that, that NASA will move off the top of
the hill and back onto that slippery slope, business as usual. You can
almost see that in the words used to describe the "rapid fire" launches to
complete the space station. So, the sooner she flies the better, as the
slippery slope only gets steeper with time.

Barbara Morgan in 2004!!!!

http://www.senate.gov/~craig/releases/pr051602b.htm

Barbara Morgan in 2004!!!!

http://www.sti.nasa.gov/tto/spinoff2002/ef.html

Barbara Morgan in 2004!!!!

http://liftoff.msfc.nasa.gov/news/2003/news-edspace.asp

Barbara Morgan in 2004!!!!

http://www.aacps.org/aacps/boe/admin...803archive.htm

Barbara Morgan in 2004!!!!

http://quest.arc.nasa.gov/calendar/summer03.html

Barbara Morgan in 2004!!!!

http://www.space.com/missionlaunches...te_030123.html

Barbara Morgan in 2004!!!!

http://mynasa.nasa.gov/lb/home/hqnew...ia_awards.html

Barbara Morgan in 2004!!!!

http://www.newstrolls.com/washpost.htm

"The next time Columbia flies will be in November, when it carries into
orbit educator-astronaut Barbara Morgan, who was the backup for Challenger
crew member Christa McAuliffe in 1986."

Barbara Morgan was scheduled on Columbia's next flight?

How about the next flight instead?

Craig Fink

jeff findley wrote:

(Hallerb) writes:

I shudder at the effect of another generation watching more deaths of
teachers in space.

Crew should be test pilots ONLY!

Barbara Morgan isn't an idiot. She's also a NASA astronaut, an actual
Mission Specialist. Unless you want to ban all Mission Specialists
from flying on the shuttle, you'd better re-think your statement.

Jeff