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falling nine times faster than a fired bullet

No, that's not how the physics works. The foam is moving at the same velocity as the shuttle when it breaks off, and had a short time to accelerate(decelerate) before hitting the shuttle.

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THANK YOU. I've seen the velocity of the space shuttle quoted as the speed that the foam had when it hit Columbia's wing so many times, and it bugs the crap out of me.

If that was the actual impact velocity of the foam, there would not be any doubt about whether the shuttle would survive reentry, that is if it even managed to make it all the way into space.

As the crew rose at 28,968 kilometres per hour the piece of foam collided with one of the tiles on the outer edge of the shuttle’s left wing.

This also cannot be correct at approx 82 seconds into flight.

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