Jim Yanik wrote:

Matt wrote in
:

Sherman wrote:
Isn't is obvious

Both shuttles that blew up were launched under cold weather conditions
in January. Then they launched this one during a heat wave. Maybe they
should try to launch under moderate conditions, say during March or
September.


It's not the ground temp,its moisture that accululates in voids in the foam
that expands under aerodynamic heating during ascent that blows off chunks
of foam.

Are you sure of that? It appears that the chunks that broke off on both
the Challenger and on this flight occurred very early on--wouldn't think
it would have gotten that hot that soon, but I don't know. First time
I've heard of this hypothesis.