I woke up today, late in the morning, to the beeping of my phone.

"AOLALERTS - BREAKING NEWS," the screen read.

I'm sure by now you all know why - the terrible loss of the STS Columbia with all hands on board.

I was taken back to when the Challenger was destroyed when I was in grade school, sixth grade or so I think, and I remember watching the news then in the school library.

My sympathies are with the families and friends of everyone who was lost.

Now, I'm about to sound insensitive, but I am absolutely not. I sincerely hope that this disaster does not provoke some knee-jerk paralyzation of the space program as the Challenger did. The brave people aboard a Space Shuttle know the risks, and they do what they do because they beileve in it. They dedicate their lives to science, the exploration of space, and the expansion of the human experience. Their deaths would be in vain if this event halted the recent developments of future projects, i.e. Prometheus.

One could argue that the massive cuts and problems NASA faced after the Challenger incident could be partially blamed, if this was caused by equipment failure. The Space Shuttles were built for 20 years of use, max. Less, much less, I believe it was assumed. These are vehicles that were designed in the 1960s, using materials that were advanced in the 70s. Newer, better designs have existed for decades now but never been implemented. The Space Shuttle itself was altered from original specs due to Air Force demands that it essentially be a flying boxcar. That's a soapbox, I'll step off of it now.

I sincerely hope we honor the memories of those lost, including the first Israeli astronaut, by stepping up development of new space technologies to advance the future of man in space. I honestly think they would have wanted it that way.