WASHINGTON, Dec. 30, 2008
NASA Details Columbia Crew's Grisly Deaths
Graphic 400-Page Report Explores Five Fatal Possibilities; Exact Causes Of Death Uncertain
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Seven astronauts were killed when space shuttle Columbia fell apart in midair. (CBS/AP)
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Interactive
Voyage's End
A flash movie in tribute to the seven extraordinary individuals aboard the shuttle Columbia.
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Interactive
The Columbia Disaster
The crew and their mission, the accident and investigation.
At least one crew member was alive and pushing buttons for half a minute after a first loud alarm sounded, as he futilely tried to right Columbia during that disastrous day Feb. 1, 2003.
In fact, by that time, there was nothing anyone could have done to survive as the fatally damaged shuttle streaked across Texas to a landing in Florida what would never take place.
But NASA scrutinizes the final minutes of the shuttle tragedy in a new 400-page report released Tuesday. The agency hopes to help engineers design a new shuttle replacement capsule more capable of surviving an accident. An internal NASA team recommends 30 changes based on Columbia, many of them aimed at pressurization suits, helmets and seatbelts.
As was already known, the astronauts died either from lack of oxygen during depressurization or from hitting something as the spacecraft spun violently out of control. The report said it wasn't clear which of those events killed them.
And in the case of the helmets and other gear, three crew members weren't wearing gloves, which provide crucial protection from depressurization. One wasn't in the seat, one wasn't wearing a helmet and several were not fully strapped in. The gloves were off because they are too bulky to do certain tasks and there is too little time to prepare for re-entry, the report notes.
Had all those procedures been followed, the astronauts might have lived longer and been able to take more actions, but they still wouldn't have survived, the report says.
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The new report comes five years after an independent investigation panel issued its own exhaustive analysis on Columbia, but it focused heavily on the cause of the accident and the culture of NASA.I guess the thing I'm surprised about, if anything, is that (the report) actually got out.
Dr. Jonathan Clark, a former NASA flight surgeon whose astronaut wife, Laurel, died aboard Columbia.The new document lists five "events" that were each potentially lethal to the crew: Loss of cabin pressure just before or as the cabin broke up; crew members, unconscious or already dead, crashing into objects in the module; being thrown from their seats and the module; exposure to a near vacuum at 100,000 feet; and hitting the ground.
A timeline of what was happening in crew compartment shows that the first loud master alarm - from a failure in control jets - would have rung at least four seconds before the shuttle went out of control.
Twenty-six seconds later either Commander Rick Husband or Pilot William McCool - in the upper deck with two other astronauts - "was conscious and able to respond to events that were occurring on board."
Shortly after that, the crew cabin depressurized, "the first event of lethal potential." That would have caused "loss of consciousness" and lack of oxygen. It took 41 seconds for complete loss of pressure.
Dr. Jonathan Clark, a former NASA flight surgeon whose astronaut wife, Laurel, died aboard Columbia, praised NASA's leadership for releasing the report "even though it says, in some ways, you guys didn't do a great job.
"I guess the thing I'm surprised about, if anything, is that (the report) actually got out," said Clark, who was a member of the team that wrote it. "There were so many forces" that didn't want to produce the report because it would again put the astronauts' families in the media spotlight.
Some of the recommendations already are being applied to the next-generation spaceship being designed to take astronauts to the moon and Mars, said Clark, who now works for the National Space Biomedical Research Institute at Baylor College of Medicine in Houston.
Kirstie McCool Chadwick, sister of pilot William McCool, said a copy of the report arrived at her Florida home by FedEx Tuesday morning but that she had not read it.
"We've moved on," Chadwick said. "I'll read it. But it's private. It's our business ... Our family has moved on from the accident and we don't want to reopen wounds.
In the immediate aftermath of the disaster, NASA appointed an independent panel to investigate its cause. That group released its blistering report on Aug. 27, 2003, warning that unless there were sweeping changes to the space program "the scene is set for another accident."
Columbia disintegrated as it returned to Earth at the end of its space mission. The accident was caused by a hole in the shuttle's left wing that occurred at launch. Here is a look at the seven who perished Feb. 1, 2003:
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congress approved $50 million to investigate an event that killed seven ... and was completely and statistically anticipated ... even expected.
how much did they spend investigating 9/11 ... and how many were really interested in investigating at all?
how much do you suppose will be spent investigating the loss of over $60 trillion lost in market value ... innumerable number of people who will suffer ... and identify the real cause of the financial disaster ... so that it won''t be as likely to occur again?
what''s wrong with this picture?
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Not if you work for the government obviously.
http://www.nasa.gov/pdf/298870main_SP-2008-565.pdf
http://www.cbsnews .com
/htdocs/pdf/shuttlereport.pdf
The mars rovers, which cost far less than a shuttle launch, have lasted far beyond their expected lifespans, and have given us an unprecedented look at Mars. Scrap the manned space program, and get to the business of building better robots!
The mars rovers, which cost far less than a shuttle launch, have lasted far beyond their expected lifespans, and have given us an unprecedented look at Mars. Scrap the manned space program, and get to the business of building better robots!
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I absoutely agree with you -- the only problem is that people are not excited about what a robot can do, but what a human can do.
Be honest which would excite you more -- the first robot to find former life on Mars or the first human to land and find former life on Mars?
Posted by hitoyou11 at 02:25 PM : Dec 30, 2008
"That''s because you''re not Barney Frank."
Posted by txgrouch2008
LOL, that''s precious!
Those who have the courage to be astronauts understand the risks... just as those who sailed the wooden ships to the new world did over 500 years ago. They also know there will be those who fall along the way but... without the desire and the bravery to explore... there would be no tomorrows outside of a dark age.
Killing astronauts and circling the earth in shoddily-built tubes is getting us nowhere. People need to stay on Earth and leave the heavy lifting to the robots.
Once that thing started to tumble it was a mercy they didn''t live longer. At that altitude, at that speed, at that temperature, if I read it right the G forces on them in their harnesses could well have killed them. Humans are really very fragile outside our little zone.
Posted by DebinOK1
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I suppose Jefferson''s Corps of Discovery (Lewis & Clark Expedition) was also a waste of taxpayer money.
A lot of materials developed for the space program make our lives better every day.
Your comment is like Jerry Seinfeld when finding out his doctor girlfriend was a dermatologist and referred to her simply as a pimple popper. (He later realized she has saved people''s lives treating their skin cancer.)
I suggest you look at the whole picture.
nasa or private subcontractors are guilty of gross negligence
there was a request to use the hubble or a keyhole satellite to look at the underside of the shuttle
there were suspicions of damage after take off
the airforce acknowledged the request
but someone canceled the order
that person or persons should be prosecuted
a second shuttle flight or the russians could have rescued the astronauts
there was reason to believe that the damage should have been examed
you, the public wont hear much about that
like the 27 pages from the congressional 911 report that were redacted...for your own good
Back in 2003, the same vehicle inspection was requested by attentive ground crew managers for Columbia, after foam debris was observed to strike the shuttle on launch.
Unfortunately, NASA senior management at the cape denied the request-- a disastrous decision which sealed the fate of all seven astronauts.
The NASA senior management decision to ignore staff concerns about Columbia was made despite a spirited public relations campaign for safety, some seven years after Challenger.
NASA management had been told to tell everybody on staff, "Safety Is Rule One". Yet, apparently many in NASA senior management, itself, scoffed at the policy as a mere slogan.
Today, in the wake of two shuttle disasters, we are tempted to think a few senior NASA managers have begun to see the error of their ways.
But why did others have to pay so dearly for their new-found caution?
On February 9, 2008, a NASA shuttle hit foam debris during launch. And in October, 2007, another NASA shuttle hit similar foam/icefalls. On that event, CBS reminded us, "A hole in the wing brought down Columbia in 2003, the result of a strike by a slab of fuel-tank foam insulation at liftoff."
In August, 2007, CBS noted still another foam/ice fall incident. On that day, CBS/AP reported, "Shuttle managers also decided Friday to put off fuel-tank preparations for the next launch until engineers decide how to best solve the latest foam-loss problem... A piece of foam, ice or a combination of both broke off the tank during Endeavour''s launch last week and shot into the shuttle''s belly..."
Clearly, NASA still has not addressed fundamental concerns of the 2003 congressional panel following the Columbia disaster-- to prevent foam/ice damage during launch, and provide an in-flight repair kit for the shuttle wing''s leading edge, should any serious damage occur.
Instead, NASA has gone low-profile on the whole remediation issue. NASA surfaced only at Bush''s invitation to launch on or about July 4, 2006. That launch was thoroughly protected from disaster by NASA''s fervent wish that nothing go wrong. To this day, that fervent wish remains NASA''s prime remedy for a problem unresolved since 2003.
And yes, there appears to be something of a cost-benefit decision, as well. After all, the remaining shuttles are expensive beasts-- all due for retirement.
They were repeatedly warned that the space station was junk, and that servicing it stress out the shuttle fleet.
But hey, presidential candidates need texas, cali and florida electoral votes so no one will stop the idiocy.
We need to abandon manned space exploration for one fundamental reason. THERE IS NO MANNED SPACE EXPLORATION. Going around the Earth in the ISS and poooping in a vacuum cleaner is not advancing science. The ISS is the scientific equivalent of camping in the back yard. It''s pointless. Let''s put some more rovers on some more planets and moons!
The Columbia crew died when the heat of re-entry and aerodynamic forces tore them apart.
Jack drown in freezing waters and Rose floated away on a door.
In these disasters, the fascination with the last inescapeable seconds really does amaze me.
They died when that piece of foam damaged the heat tile. They died because some at NASA thought it too expensive to plan for the contingency of heat tile damage, even though they knew it probable.
They died because the o-ring froze and the design of the SRB joint was prone to leakage and because some at NASA thought it too expensive to fix.
Given what we get out of the program, I think we MUST keep doing it.
Define soft. Now, define soft at 16,000 MPH.
So the dead astronauts get to have their hands slapped posthumously by this report for not following procedures. I wonder what NASA''s "procedure" is for dealing with a complete and violent structural failure of the shuttle during reentry where the occupants have maybe a minute from the first alarm until near certain death? These were all highly trained individuals who would follow procedure to the nth degree until there was no procedure to follow. Maybe the astronauts other than the Commander and Pilot were trying to make sure their helmets and/or gloves were secure in order to try to survive a rapid cabin depressurization. Maybe gloves, helmets, and seat belts were wrenched out of place when the shuttle began to break apart. It doesn''t matter, had they all been strapped in and following "procedure" they still would have died. Many mistakes were made in this disaster, yes, but I for one don''t believe the astronauts who paid the ultimate price should be blamed in any way for events beyond their control. Their legacies and their families deserve better.
There is debate on the checklist that if the charging of the LOX was done later in the sequence, there is no need for the foam at all.
There was no need for an O2 environment in Grissom''s Apollo caspsule. (MacCaffey & White)
Perhaps the whole of the issue is to turn the operation over to the Navy. The military has what is known as "acceptable" losses (which is, of course, any and all).
Think again! The micro-processor in your computer and through-out your car, many modern insulation material, many composite materials, etc. were spinoffs from NASA. Yes they probably would have been developed eventually but it would have taken longer. Add into that information that we have gained on global mapping and environmental research that could only be done from space. Anyone who is likely to be posting on the internet also likely has benefited from the Space Program.
I guess we can choose to see it as some sort of blessing that their terror wasn''t prolonged by "procedures" since they were doomed anyway because of the initial damage.
I still grieve for our space ( as well as war ) heroes.
Clearly you''ve never used any sort of technology, and you''ve never bought something from a store, because you''re implying that things we got from the space program, like bar codes, are a waste of time! Next time you''re in a long line at a supermarket or other store, just think about how much longer the line would be if there weren''t any bar codes.
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by Krazcarl
January 2, 2009 12:44 PM EST
- As I see this they did nothing wrong and deserve hero status and my respect bou on the other hand outsideofthegreat hubble pictures thespaceprogram is one very large waste of cash thereareno habitable planets in our solar system the 2 best canidates are venus {over 600 degrees at the equator and mars 60 below at the equator your choice of camping out on the north pole or in a volcano were traped untill we can travel the speed of light and even then it will take years to get there. This money should be spent on earth based projects heating homes better batteries mining the ocean and even ocean based comunities for aqua-culture and mining not wasted going to dead planets that my friends is centries away. Oh yea helium 3 is just propaganda to justfy the wasteof cash.
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