Ride Praises Efforts to Redesign Shuttle--Would Return to Space

Astronaut Sally K. Ride, a bureaucrat in National Aeronautics and Space Administration headquarters while the space shuttle is being redesigned, said Tuesday that the space agency has done a good job and that she has changed her mind about going into orbit again.

In the wake of the Challenger explosion on Jan. 28, Ride was quoted as saying she would not want to ride the shuttle. But she said that is now in the past.

“I think NASA has done a real good job studying the solid rockets, studying the redesigns and doing the testing that would be necessary to get the space program back,” she said while promoting her new book, “To Space and Back,” on NBC’s “Today” program.

“That’s really what I meant back in March. We needed to step back and understand what went wrong before anyone should be flying in the space shuttle again, and NASA has done that,” she said. “So I think all astronauts are eager for that program to be finished and for one of us to get back into the space shuttle.”