ad astra!

Hail Columbia and the Heroes of STS-107
Brown – Clark – Chawla – Anderson – Ramon – Husband – McCool

Image above: STS107-735-032 — The STS-107 crewmembers pose for their traditional in-flight crew portrait aboard the Space Shuttle Columbia. From the left (bottom row, red team) are astronauts Kalpana Chawla, mission specialist; Rick D. Husband, mission commander; Laurel B. Clark, mission specialist; and Ilan Ramon, payload specialist. From the left (top row, blue team) are astronauts David M. Brown, mission specialist; William C. McCool, pilot; and Michael P. Anderson, payload commander. Credit: NASA


OV-102 Columbia prior to her final flight. (NASA photograph)

“She along with the crew had her life snuffed out in her prime. Just as her crew has, Columbia has left us quite a legacy….hail Columbia.”
    —Captain Robert Crippen (Pilot, STS-1)

I have a little bit more to say about this mission and tragedy than Challenger (and Apollo 1, from January 27) because on January 16, 2003 at 10:39 I was able to see something I had wanted to witness since I was a little kid: a shuttle launch. I learned about the crew—I was interested to find that Ilan Ramon, Israel’s first astronaut, even shared my birthday—and their science mission, and was even on the KSC tour bus with Rick Husband’s wife and kids.

Mission insignia of STS-107.

I’ll never forget a little girl’s proud voice saying, “My daddy’s the commander!” and wondering what it would be like to be a little kid whose daddy was an astronaut.

So February 1st will always be a very sad day for me; I remember seeing Challenger on television but I will always feel a personal connection to this crew and to Columbia, who were fated not to return to us.

There is heavy grief in our hearts, which will diminish with time, but it will never go away. And we won’t ever forget. Hail Rick, Willie, K.C., Mike, Laurel, Dave and Ilan. Hail Columbia.
    —Captain Robert Crippen (Pilot, STS-1)

More:
NASA Human Spaceflight Crew Memorial Page
NASA History Office Memorial
NASA Shuttle Mission Archive
Shuttle Columbia and Her Crew
Mars Rover Spirit Honors the Crew of Space Shuttle Columbia
And, eerily, you can hear the final Wake Up Calls for the crew (RealAudio .rm):

• Red Team – “Scotland the Brave” by The Black Watch and the band of the 51st Highland Brigade (for Laurel Clark)
• Blue Team – “If You’ve Been Delivered” by Kirk Franklin (For Michael Anderson)

Twenty-five years ago, on 28 January 1986 at 11:39 AM EST the Space Shuttle Challenger was lost with all hands. This was at the time the largest loss of any crew in the history of space exploration, and by far the first to be so public.

The 27th marks the 44th anniversary of the Apollo 1 fire, the 28th the Challenger Disaster, and the 1st of February the loss of Columbia and her crew. All great and daring endeavors carry a cost—these 17 brave men and women paid the highest price.

11:39:13.628    Last validated Orbiter telemetry measurement
11:39:13.641    End of last reconstructured data frame with
                valid synchronization and frame count
11:39:14.140    Last radio frequency signal from Orbiter
11:39:14.597    Bright flash in vicinity of Orbiter nose

Here’s a slightly updated repost of my original post from 2007:

In Memory of STS-51L and her Courageous Crew of Seven Heroes
McNair – Onizuka – Resnick – McAuliffe – Jarvis – Scobee – Smith

Image above: STS-51L Crew photo with Commander Francis R. Scobee, Pilot Michael J. Smith, Mission Specialists Judith A. Resnik, Ellison S. Onizuka, Ronald E. McNair and Payload Specialists Gregory B. Jarvis and Sharon Christa McAuliffe. Image Credit: NASA

We will never forget them, nor the last time we saw them, this morning, as they prepared for their journey and waved goodbye and “slipped the surly bonds of earth” to “touch the face of God.”
    President Reagan, Address to the Nation, January 28, 1986

The Rogers Commission, upon investigation into the cause of the disaster, concluded:

The consensus of the Commission and participating investigative agencies is that the loss of the Space Shuttle Challenger was caused by a failure in the joint between the two lower segments of the right Solid Rocket Motor. The specific failure was the destruction of the seals that are intended to prevent hot gases from leaking through the joint during the propellant burn of the rocket motor. The evidence assembled by the Commission indicates that no other element of the Space Shuttle system contributed to this failure.

More:
NASA’s STS-51L Mission Page
NASA’s page for resources on the Challenger disaster

On the 27th of January 1967 a fatal fire claimed the first American lives of space exploration. This was the first disaster NASA had to cope with that cost human lives. The victims were:

• Vigil Ivan “Gus” Grissom— USAF Lt. Col. and veteran of Mercury-Redstone 4 (“Liberty Bell 7″) and Gemini 3 (“Molly Brown”).
• Edward Higgins White II— USAF Lt. Col. and veteran of Gemini 4.
• Roger Bruce Chaffee— USN Lt. Commander and native of Grand Rapids, MI.

NASA formed the Apollo 204 Review Board, which determined the cause of the accident was a result of several different engineering decisions that went into the design of the Apollo capsule:

• The highly pressurized 100% oxygen environment of the capsule,
• Wear and tear and the placement of electrical wiring inside the capsule,
• The overabundance of inflammable velcro placed throughout the cabin,
• Buildup of static electricity, at least in part due to the nylon suits worn by the astronauts.

Despite these conclusions the actual cause of the Apollo 1 fire was never determined.

In my hometown of Grand Rapids, Madison Ave between 32nd and 44th streets was renamed Roger B. Chaffee Memorial Boulevard, as is the planetarium at the Public Museum.

While officially designated Apollo/Saturn-204 at the time of the fire, the widows asked NASA to rename the mission Apollo 1.

Hail Columbia and the Heroes of STS-107
Brown – Clark – Chawla – Anderson – Ramon – Husband – McCool

Image above: STS107-735-032 — The STS-107 crewmembers pose for their traditional in-flight crew portrait aboard the Space Shuttle Columbia. From the left (bottom row, red team) are astronauts Kalpana Chawla, mission specialist; Rick D. Husband, mission commander; Laurel B. Clark, mission specialist; and Ilan Ramon, payload specialist. From the left (top row, blue team) are astronauts David M. Brown, mission specialist; William C. McCool, pilot; and Michael P. Anderson, payload commander. Credit: NASA


OV-102 Columbia prior to her final flight. (NASA photograph)

“She along with the crew had her life snuffed out in her prime. Just as her crew has, Columbia has left us quite a legacy….hail Columbia.”
    —Captain Robert Crippen (Pilot, STS-1)

I have a little bit more to say about this mission and tragedy than Challenger (and Apollo 1, from January 27) because on January 16, 2003 at 10:39 I was able to see something I had wanted to witness since I was a little kid: a shuttle launch. I learned about the crew—I was interested to find that Ilan Ramon, Israel’s first astronaut, even shared my birthday—and their science mission, and was even on the KSC tour bus with Rick Husband’s wife and kids.

Mission insignia of STS-107.

I’ll never forget a little girl’s proud voice saying, “My daddy’s the commander!” and wondering what it would be like to be a little kid whose daddy was an astronaut.

So February 1st will always be a very sad day for me; I remember seeing Challenger on television but I will always feel a personal connection to this crew and to Columbia, who were fated not to return to us.

More:
NASA Human Spaceflight Crew Memorial Page
NASA History Office Memorial
NASA Shuttle Mission Archive
Shuttle Columbia and Her Crew
Mars Rover Spirit Honors the Crew of Space Shuttle Columbia
And, eerily, you can hear the final Wake Up Calls for the crew (RealAudio .rm):

• Red Team – “Scotland the Brave” by The Black Watch and the band of the 51st Highland Brigade (for Laurel Clark)
• Blue Team – “If You’ve Been Delivered” by Kirk Franklin (For Michael Anderson)