SPACE SHUTTLE COLUMBIA - How and why the tragic accident happened.
 

This is why and how it happened:

When Columbia started into Orbit, the Shuttle lost part of the isolation of one of its fuel tanks.

This piece of isolation hit the left wing of Columbia.

NASA said last Friday it believed this damage to be "insignificant".

"It should not cause problems at re-entry of the Shuttle", they said.

They were wrong.

God were they wrong.

A reasonable question: Why NO EVA to verify no damage when they were docked with the ISS??

That piece of debris that came apart and impacted the wing upon launch may have damaged part of the heat shield system. Of course, without that protection, the 3000 degrees of heat generated during re-entry may have caused the disintegration of the shuttle. :(

That's one of the first things I was wondering this morning as well.

I heard it was Ice but the fact of the matter is there was no EVA Inspection or even a visual done of the damage the Tile Insulation system is fragile!

They had time in space to check the wing.

on the early shuttles the Insulation was Balsa wood (fuel tank)now I do not know what they use!

I think while your report is true about a piece of insulation breaking off on liftoff and hitting the leading edge of the wing, you are a bit premature about the cause of this tragety. unless you are affiliated with NASA and know more than the rest of us, Speculation is not advised.

Not my speculation, Nasa representitive speaking on the radio...
Sorry, should've mentioned it.

sorry , i was respoding to Apache

Sorry, no problemo. :cool:

Originally posted by gdfatha:
A reasonable question: Why NO EVA to verify no damage
when they were docked with the ISS??

gdfatha: They were NOT docked with the ISS!

All Shuttles before did dock with ISS.

Columbia was the only one which did not dock - they just did their 80 experiments on their own.

Thanks for the clarification.

I got confused after watching the ISS on the NASA channel.

It would be hard to speculate on what happend. At 12,500 MPH it wouldn't take much to make a disaster.

If you wanted to focus on the tiles, there are about 28,000 of which about 5,000 are considered critical and the loss of one of those 5,000 are consided to make reentry impossible. If I remeber they are made of some kind of silica compound and glued to the skin of the shuttle.

Also in years past a guy in North Dakota or Minnesota claimed to have intercepted a reenntry conversation in which the crew was concerned about cabin temperature on reentry.

Re-entry is very dangerous:

Imagine: 90 tons...

...traveling @12500mph...

...virtually "burning" itsself through the atmosphere.

It's almost not possible to imagine these forces.

Then add a minor damage of the heat shield...

Tragic, YES.....Godspeed to all 7....Lets don`t forget the human factor. We are learning everyday of are lives. These machines are as complex as anything on earth and lives will be lost as we move forward. I`m a fanatic of space exploration,but there is a price we must pay to move forward with technalogy and new frontiers. It will never be easy or a given,and they the astronauts know the risks. I salute them and their passion for knowledge.

Debris field

Here Columbia lost part of fuel-tank isolation at lift-off
 

The isolation hit the left wing.

Without words...

I think it's already been mentioned, but this mission was purely a scientific mission. No ISS, just gathering data and doing experiments. Appearently they were heading home a little early. They could have stayed in orbit until Wednesday. Sounds like it wouldn't have mattered when, it still had to make re-entry. Once they launched, there is an abort procedure (I had the pleasure of taking the controls of the simulator at JSC that they use for training and the guy running it ran us through a launch abort procedure) but they would still have re-entry and manuvering to get it back into landing position. It goes to show just how critical preperation and the first 8 minutes of the mission are.

God bless their families.

O.K. And when you do the EVA and find damage, what do you do then? Let everyone say goodbye to their families? The nearest Mr. Goodwrench is a pretty good hike. EVA's are dangerous in themselves. I suspect they weighed the risks and decided not to.:(

"O.K. And when you do the EVA and find damage, what do you do then?"

That's a good one!

That would have felt quite lonely "HELP!" ..but can you imagine the dream-ratings on TV worldwide for over 1 week?

That would have been good for the global economy...
(Sorry...not the right moment I know, but couln't resist).

But really: imagine they do EVA, they find that the wing is damaged and tiles are lost... then what? Only chance would be to dock on the ISS for survival.

Nasa now saying (as reported by Dan Rather) that during re-entry, telemetry was first lost regarding systems and functions in the left wing. I would be very suprised if this was all coincidence but Im no rocket scientist.

I have no idea why the great one above could let trsgedies like this happen. You know it will be years before we truthfully know what really happened this morning. I am not anti-Government, but I dont think we will know for a while. I'm sure that they will take this into account with their other shuttles. The Columbia was over ten years old if I remember right. I think that this was the most used of all the shuttles, so imagine 10 years, lots of re entries around 12,000 mph.

God Bless the family and friends of the 7 astronauts.

Columbia went into service in 1981.

NASA will very likely not tell you anything/much for the next 12 months...

After the tragic crash on Jan 28 1986 it took them forever to find the real cause. (And: remember the Concorde crash? Took Air France 10 month to find the cause - and they had the plane to study - not burned Shuttle debris shattered over 100sqrmls).

There can be only 3 reasons for this tragedy:

A) Structural failure (doubtfull, as NASA triple checks everything)

B) Human error at re-entry (almost impossible, it's on auto pilot)

C) Damage of steering/telemetry (as Dan Rather reported) and/or damage of heat shield and maybe even the structure of the left wing. Either by ice or by debris of isolation at lift-off.

I was always amazed about the Shuttle technology. Over 25 years old and state of the art. But if something goes wrong...

Jan 28 1986:

115 Flights. All that re-entry heat is bound to weaken the metal.

INTERESTING ARTICLE
 

What If...

http://www.israelinsider.com/channel...s/sec_0259.htm

"115 Flights. All that re-entry heat is bound to weaken the metal."

Not neccessarily:

The ceramic tiles are always fresh. And the structure is examined by radar before each flight.

NASA said the Shuttle is built for 100 missions. I think this was mission 28 for Columbia. The whole fleet flew I think 115 missions.

Re: INTERESTING ARTICLE
 

I haven't read the article but just looking at the link, it's sad but this day and time you have to consider things that make people uncomfortable. I know I've already had different scenerios running through my head on that subject.....and I hate that I have.

all the electronic systems on columbia were brand new this flight. This was the first time the new systems were used in a space flight.

it could be anythign at this point that caused this. Too early to tell.

Sure, it was Saddam!

Now that's finally a good reason for Bush to "flatten Iraq to a parking lot".

Come on, even Bush says this was NOT an act of terror.

The crew is checked (no terrorist there). The security was drastically increased by NASA.

There was no rocket (try to hit this thing going 12500mph in 200.000ft!). But sure, Saddam would manage this...

No, this tragedy happened at the most dangerous part of the mission: In the middle of re-entry, when the tiles are hottest. 8 more minutes and it would be out of danger.

Just read that. Amazing technology.

The shuttle was over 200,000 feet up, the only rocket that would be able to shoot it would be another shuttle.

Did they use Microsoft Windows?
 

"Puder", did they use Microsoft Windows?

Brandnew Computer System...

...perhaps this was "Windows 2003 beta"?

(sorry, I know this is crude joke but I couldn't resist...).

But really: Columbia had a new "internet server" installed. To be non-stop connected to the internet. This was never done before and difficult to achieve in orbit.

The flight electronics was the proven version. I think nothing new there.

I friggin hate the fact that the media is even playing the "terrorism card". I know that f%cker is sitting in a cave somwhere laughing at the fact that every time anything goes wrong, we think it might have been him behind it. Truth is, the sniper was a POS criminal and space travel is dangerous...nothing more.

"I friggin hate the fact that the media is even playing the "terrorism card". I know that f%cker is sitting in a cave somwhere laughing at the fact that every time anything goes wrong, we think it might have been him behind it."

You got it.

But: He is also used as an excuse by ...Putin for his war ...by Sharon ...by Bush ...by Blair to introduce ID cards ...by Poindexter to "monitor the everyday move of every American"...and...and...and...

If he wouldn't exist you'd have to invent him.

Columbia Lift-off
 

Minutes later part of the fuel-tank insulation (the brown insulation on the huge tank) got lost and hit the left wing.

The Tiles were always a critical issue

They used to carry a type of slurry for patch work I am not sure of what they have on board nowdays for repairs!

The orbiter is made from Aluminum and the surface temperature on the hot side reaches better than 2500 F degrees on reentry.

So it does not take much Imagination to see the consequences of the heat shielding being damaged: In the wrong area.

In the very first launch of the Columbia they were worried about the tiles if you remember to the point;

that the Military said rotate the ship untill underside is visible from earth, they then took a picture of it; and told them your tiles are ok!!

The amazing thing is it was 112 miles up at the time and NASA was astounded that such technology even existed let alone was in use! You have to remember that these tiles some were very small.

That is amazing:

Columbia 112 miles in the air and the military could make a photo so detailed all tiles were seen to check them. And that must have been 1981 (the first flight of Columbia).

Why didn't they check this time?

Crash happened in the most critical phase.
 

The most dangerous phase is at 200.000 to 230.000ft - there you have the highest temperatures: 1600-1700C Celsius.

What is important also is that the flight trim has to be exact as calculated, otherwise the heat gets stuck in one area. If the telematics did fail and the left wing went lower and got much hotter, this leads to overheating. Even with all tiles intact (which they were probably not).

Just heared that the debris shattered Texas... many pieces 3-4ft long ...the area is 200mls wide ...incredible...

Here one remaining piece of Columbia:

It is sick to do the terrorism crap. The only thing that could have shot at the shuttle from 200,000 feet away, is another shuttle.

Another sick thing about this is people are picking up the tiles. I bet there selling them on ebay. Some people should just be shot. I hope they monitor auction sites and get people who do this.

Baja I am with you anyone who tries to profit from this in that manner should be jailed or worse!

heres what im talking about

http://cgi.ebay.com/ws/eBayISAPI.dll...&category=1468

http://cgi.ebay.com/ws/eBayISAPI.dll...category=11153

http://cgi.ebay.com/ws/eBayISAPI.dll...category=11153

http://cgi.ebay.com/ws/eBayISAPI.dll...category=11153

tile:
http://cgi.ebay.com/ws/eBayISAPI.dll...category=13904