BEIJING, Dec. 30 (Xinhuanet) -- NASA has refitted a space shuttle fuel tank to decrease the likelihood of the debris problem that doomed the shuttle Columbia and its seven astronauts from happening again, agency officials said on Tuesday.

    The refitted tank will be shipped on Friday from a NASA facility near New Orleans to the Kennedy Space Center in Florida, as the space

NASA will take a major step this week toward returning astronauts to space when engineers ship a fuel tank that has been refitted to decrease the likelihood of the falling debris that caused the destruction of the space shuttle Columbia.

agency prepares to launch shuttle Discovery in May or early June.

    The tank is made by the Lockheed Martin Corporation.

    Sandy Coleman, the external tank project manager for the National Aeronautics and Space Administration, said improvements made on the fuel tank gave the space agency "confidence that problems like what happened on Columbia will not happen again."

    "This is the safest, most reliable tank NASA has ever produced," Ms. Coleman said in a telephone news conference from the Marshall Space Flight Center in Huntsville, Ala.

    The cost of the new tank, including tests and redesign, is still being calculated, but it will be more expensive than the old-style tank, which cost $40 million, Ms. Coleman said.

    "We can never completely eliminate foam coming off the tank," Ms. Coleman said. But she said tests suggested that any debris that flew off the new tank would not cause damage like that which destroyed the Columbia.

    The move of shipping had been considered as a major step forward in returning the U.S. space program to manned flight after the shuttles were grounded when Columbia broke apart over Texas on Feb. 1, 2003. Enditem

    (Agencies)