Mysterious purple streak hitting Columbia 7 minutes before it disintegrated in unreproduced photo: SF Chronicle opens the floodgates.

The day that this story is published, it’s worth noting, NASA explicitly downplayed [NYT] the leading “tank foam debris” theory.

Sure will be interesting when this photo is finally published.

UPDATE: Rob Falk notes further coverage of the West Coast photographic evidence at the Chronicle.

Rob is an amateur astronomer and avid skygazer, I bet his insights will be helpful to me over the next few months on this matter.