3rd February 2003, 9:35 PM
Some people have responded to the tragedy by saying that the manned space program should be scrapped and only drones should be sent into space... I find that ridiculous. I think that we should have a lot more missions to and people going to space, not less... we do need a better launch vehicle, though. Its really too bad that NASA seems to have shelved those next-gen shuttle replacement ideas... some of them seemed good, and NASA just can't rely on the aging shuttles for too much longer. But they have to, because a replacement is years away... I don't see how they get out of it -- they have to use the shuttles. I just wish a better (faster, cheaper, safer, etc) vehicle was available sooner.