“Bowersox was an astronaut on the International Space Station when NASA lost Columbia. He and his crewmates were waiting to hitch a ride home on the next Space Shuttle mission, which was delayed two-and-a-half years in the wake of the Columbia accident. Instead, Bowersox’s crew came back to Earth later that year on a Russian Soyuz capsule. After retiring from the astronaut corps, Bowersox worked at SpaceX and is now the head of NASA’s spaceflight operations directorate. ”
“Stich was a flight director on Columbia’s final mission. He manned one of three shifts of flight control teams monitoring Columbia’s activities in orbit on its 16-day research flight. NASA engineers analyzing imagery from the Columbia’s launch on January 16, 2003, discovered that a suitcase-sized piece of insulating foam fell from the shuttle’s external fuel tank and struck a portion of the orbiter’s left wing…. Stich emailed Rick Husband, Columbia’s commander, a week into the mission to inform him of the foam strike. ‘Experts have reviewed the high-speed photography, and there is no concern for RCC (Reinforced Carbon Carbon) or tile damage,’ Stich wrote. ‘We have seen this same phenomenon on several other flights, and there is absolutely no concern for entry.'”
“LeRoy Cain, now at Boeing, was the flight director on console in mission control at NASA’s Johnson Space Center during Columbia’s reentry on February 1, 2003. In real-time, over the course of about 10 minutes, Cain received updates from his team suggesting a cascading series of sensor failures on the shuttle, all clustered in Columbia’s left wing. Then, mission control lost contact with the shuttle and its crew.”
2 Comments
Just don’t trust boeing and you’re probably fine
“Bowersox was an astronaut on the International Space Station when NASA lost Columbia. He and his crewmates were waiting to hitch a ride home on the next Space Shuttle mission, which was delayed two-and-a-half years in the wake of the Columbia accident. Instead, Bowersox’s crew came back to Earth later that year on a Russian Soyuz capsule. After retiring from the astronaut corps, Bowersox worked at SpaceX and is now the head of NASA’s spaceflight operations directorate. ”
“Stich was a flight director on Columbia’s final mission. He manned one of three shifts of flight control teams monitoring Columbia’s activities in orbit on its 16-day research flight. NASA engineers analyzing imagery from the Columbia’s launch on January 16, 2003, discovered that a suitcase-sized piece of insulating foam fell from the shuttle’s external fuel tank and struck a portion of the orbiter’s left wing…. Stich emailed Rick Husband, Columbia’s commander, a week into the mission to inform him of the foam strike. ‘Experts have reviewed the high-speed photography, and there is no concern for RCC (Reinforced Carbon Carbon) or tile damage,’ Stich wrote. ‘We have seen this same phenomenon on several other flights, and there is absolutely no concern for entry.'”
“LeRoy Cain, now at Boeing, was the flight director on console in mission control at NASA’s Johnson Space Center during Columbia’s reentry on February 1, 2003. In real-time, over the course of about 10 minutes, Cain received updates from his team suggesting a cascading series of sensor failures on the shuttle, all clustered in Columbia’s left wing. Then, mission control lost contact with the shuttle and its crew.”