20 Quotes by Ron Dittemore

We're going to pause and reflect upon the crew of Columbia, their lives, their contributions, their memory, and although we cannot stop our investigation and the recovery effort, we will pause in this location to take the time to reflect upon their lives, their sacrifice. It's a day of remembering. It's a day of remembering our friends, and for us it's a day of mourning.

We are getting thousands of pieces of information and the teams are working through each piece deliberately.

We're becoming very organized and making progress in support of each other.

We're satisfied that the necessary precautions have taken place or we wouldn't launch.

Right now, it just does not make sense to us that a piece of debris is the root cause to explain the loss of the Columbia crew. There has got to be another reason.

We are gaining evidence that this was thermal problem rather than a problem with sensors.

It could be indicative of a rough tile or missing tile. We are not sure yet. I don't have a smoking gun. I don't have anything that shows a root cause.

It goes back to, how likely is it that you'll have a defect? Very low. And what is your test experience? Overwhelmingly positive. Then you look at your design, and your design is to be very safe. And you look at those, and it's a compelling story.

It is one of the most complex station assembly flights that we will conduct.