It was 20 years in the past immediately (Feb. 1) that seven astronauts misplaced their lives throughout a spaceflight.
The spacecraft Columbia broke up in the course of the touchdown phase of the STS-107 mission in 2003, scattering items of the space shuttle throughout the southern United States. The company paused shuttle flights for greater than two years whereas investigating the causes of the incident, and solely resumed full flight operations in 2006.
A number of NASA astronauts shared their experiences of the tragic day throughout an company city corridor Jan. 26 to mark the company’s annual Day of Remembrance for fallen spaceflyers.
“I wish to encourage any of you who weren’t right here when Columbia occurred, to hunt out somebody who was — and ask them to inform their story, the way it affected them and the way it affected the company,” NASA deputy administrator Pam Melroy mentioned on the livestreamed city corridor.
Melroy, a two-time space shuttle astronaut who was on the company in the course of the Columbia tragedy, mentioned NASA should preserve an “acute consciousness” of “why we should all the time give attention to security, and never stress to launch … why we have to be rigorous in groups to ensure we’re not making use of groupthink to a fancy subject.”
Associated: Columbia report faults NASA culture, government oversight
Like all spacecraft accidents, the basis causes of Columbia’s and its crew’s demise had been advanced. These causes are detailed in a six-volume report (opens in new tab) issued by the unbiased Columbia Accident Investigation Board (CAIB) later in 2003.
Based on that board, the first technical reason for the incident was a bit of froth insulation that fell unfastened from a “bipod” (shuttle attachment) area of the exterior gas tank in the course of the flight’s launch on Jan. 16, hanging the forefront of Columbia’s left wing. The falling foam precipitated a breach within the re-entry safety system wanted to guard the crew because the shuttle got here again into Earth’s atmosphere.
Related to that technical subject was a sequence of associated organizational issues resembling an absence of imaginative and prescient, immense schedule stress for launches, finances constraints and cutbacks to the company’s workforce, CAIB investigations discovered.
“It’s our view that advanced methods virtually all the time fail in advanced methods, and we imagine it could be improper to scale back the complexities and weaknesses related to these methods to some easy clarification,” CAIB members wrote of their introduction (opens in new tab) to the primary quantity.
“Too typically, accident investigations blame a failure solely on the final step in a fancy course of, when a extra complete understanding of that course of may reveal that earlier steps may be equally or much more culpable.”
Associated: Space shuttle Columbia’s final mission (STS-107) in photos
Foam shedding had occurred quite a few occasions earlier than throughout shuttle launches, regardless that the shuttle system wasn’t designed to do it; CAIB officers instructed foam loss occurred on greater than 80% of 79 missions “for which imagery was out there to verify or rule out foam loss.”
Throughout Columbia’s closing flight, NASA engineers knew the froth had struck the shuttle’s wing and several other “particles evaluation” conferences had been held, in keeping with CAIB documentation (opens in new tab) based mostly on a sequence of interviews and company e-mails obtained by board members. NASA had additionally issued a short request to the U.S. Division of Protection for high-resolution “spy satellite” imagery of the affected space, however rescinded it inside 90 minutes, CAIB evaluation decided.
“Mission managers understood that the related query was not whether or not foam posed a safety-of-flight subject — it did — however reasonably whether or not the noticed foam strike contained adequate kinetic vitality to trigger injury that would result in a burn-through,” CAIB wrote within the second quantity of its report.
“Right here, all the important thing managers had been asking the fitting query and admitting the hazard. They even recognized [the tiles] as a important affect zone. But little follow-through occurred with both the request for imagery, or the particles evaluation workforce evaluation.”
Area historian John Logsdon served on CAIB and instructed Area.com that, in his view, a number of of the issues recognized within the Challenger space shuttle’s deadly accident of 1986, which killed seven astronauts, recurred throughout Columbia.
Challenger’s demise resulted from an explosion throughout launch as a result of failure of a key half in a stable rocket booster, referred to as an O-ring, however schedule stress and different organizational issues performed a task as nicely.
Logsdon recalled fellow board member and former NASA astronaut Sally Ride, who had served on the board investigating Challenger as nicely, telling her fellow CAIB members that she heard “echoes of Challenger” in Columbia’s demise.
A complete chapter in Quantity 1 of CAIB compares the varied causes of the 2 accidents, opening with a press release saying the Columbia board noticed “unlucky similarities between the company’s efficiency and security practices in each intervals” previous to the 2 shuttle tragedies.
At NASA immediately, the surroundings surrounding crewed missions is advanced another way, Logsdon mentioned. The company provides contractors for its International Space Station industrial crew program (SpaceX and Boeing) extra oversight of their very own spacecraft, for instance. Moreover, a choice of NASA astronauts fly aboard Soyuz spacecraft which might be managed by Russia’s space company, Roscosmos.
Logsdon mentioned that as a semi-retired professor emeritus at George Washington College in Washington, D.C., not taking a look at day-to-day space actions, “I am not snug passing judgment on the present state of the protection program.” That mentioned, Logsdon famous “frequent sense” would make it unlikely {that a} third security incident would come up in precisely the identical means as Challenger or Columbia.
NASA administrator Invoice Nelson mentioned on the city corridor that the company is dedicated to remaining cautious and listening to the consultants. “Converse up,” he instructed workers. “A query, even a easy query, is extra forgivable than a mistake that may end up in a tragedy.”
Nelson himself flew on a space shuttle mission that landed lower than two weeks earlier than the Challenger catastrophe.
“Every of us,” Nelson mentioned, “has a accountability to domesticate a piece surroundings the place each member of the NASA household feels empowered to voice doubt. Make your considerations heard. Talk overtly.”
Comply with Elizabeth Howell on Twitter @howellspace (opens in new tab). Comply with us on Twitter @Spacedotcom (opens in new tab) or Fb.
