Sir, - On many occasions you have given Goal's John O'Shea a platform in your letters column, and, considering his sterling work on behalf of the world's poor, this is well deserved. However his attack on this particular element of NASA's space programme is knee-jerk and ill-informed reaction to valuable scientific work.
The spacecraft Shoemaker was collecting valuable data on asteroids, amongst other things, and at the last minute NASA decided to see if it was possible to land on the asteroid Eros. This they did although it was not the single aim of the mission.
John O'Shea would do well to note that were one of the many asteroids that abound in our galaxy to hurtle towards earth, the research done by Shoemaker may well turn out to be a lot more beneficial than he thinks. Of the many benefits to humankind of NASA's space programme, the work relating to asteroids may turn out to be the most beneficial. If dinosaur fossils could talk they would emphatically concur. - Yours, etc,
Paul Williams, The Cooperation Fund Foundation,00-400 Warsaw