The aft steering jets, controlled remotely from the Thomas Dorian Space Center, were keeping the orbiter at a forty-degree attitude. Friction from air molecules was heating the bottom of the orbiter to a temperature of almost three thousand degrees. At this most critical stage, the hot ionized gases surrounding the craft would soon prevent radio contact with the ground.In the Control Tower, Noah Gettleman paced the upper command deck, his eyes fixed on the wall monitors and the scrolling readouts. The computer telemetry controlling the orbiter’s flight angle and speed was keeping the Naiad's port engine cooler than it would have been normally, reducing the chance of reentry heat potentially destroying the engine. Once the communications blackout began, a quickly-written guidance program would automatically take over. There had been little time to calculate an accurate simulation, but the engineers had given it their best shot. If their numbers were correct, the orbiter would come out of the blackout period with both engines intact.
