Space Shuttle Columbia Lost over the Skies in Central TX
 

Please turn on a national news feed or NPR for details. Debris is falling over the area and there were no signs of trouble from the shuttle before it disappeared.

Pray for the families of the astronauts.

The President is scheduled to speak to the country in a little while.

It appears OV-102 (Columbia) broke up upon reentry into the earth's atmosphere at well over 100,000 feet over North Texas. Reports are coming in (unconfirmed) of pieces of the Orbiter coming down over NE Texas near Palestine and SE Oklahoma. NASA instructing people not to touch any wreckage because of the possiblility of hazardous material. (The steering rockets of the orbiter carry highly corrosive and hypergolic (which literally explode when mixed) fuels. (Nitrogen tetroxide (oxidizer) and monomethyl hydrazine (fuel).)

If we die, we want people to accept it. The conquest of space is worth the risk of life. -- Lt. Col. Virgil I. (Gus) Grissom, at a press conference before the Apollo 1 fire in 1967.

My prayers to the families of the astronauts at this tragic time.

This happened almost exactly 17 years to the hour(!) that the Challenger exploded shortly after lift-off (January 28, 1986).

My thoughts and prayers are with the astronauts' families and prayers for the astronauts.

Sarah

Not quite. Challenger (OV-099) 'bought the farm' on January 28, 1986. I remember that day as if it were yesterday.

Unlikely, but until a thorough investigation is conducted, any possibility must be investigated.

Absolutely crazy.

My prayers go out to the families.

Lord, guard and guide the men who fly
Through the great spaces of the sky;
Be with them traversing the air
In darkening storms or sunshine fair

Thou who dost keep with tender might
The balanced birds in all their flight
Thou of the tempered winds be near
That, having thee, they know no fear

Control their minds with instinct fit
What time, adventuring, they quit
The firm security of land;
Grant steadfast eye and skillful hand

Aloft in solitudes of space,
Uphold them with Thy saving grace.
O God, protect the men who fly
Thru lonely ways beneath the sky.

The U.S. Air Force Hymn

That is why it was almost 17 years - both occurred in the early morning hours (give or take 2 hours). Basically it was about 17 years, 3 days, and a few hours. It is still rather eerily similar and very much as tragic.

Sarah


P.S. They (White House, NASA, etc) have ruled out terrorism because of the height and rate of descent.

Unconfirmed report from local TV station here in Dallas that a piece of the Orbiter appears to have struck the roof of an apartment complex almost practically in my neighborhood in Plano. (Actually, about five miles away, at the intersection of Park and Shiloh Road).

I say again, this report is UNCONFIRMED.

Well I just found out about it. My roommate told me as I walked into the bathroom; he didn’t want to wake me up with the bad news. Any tragedy like this affects our nation greatly but when you grow up in the area I did where having an astronaut as a soccer coach is normal it can really take your breath away. In my prayers.

Official press release from NASA:

Robert Mirelson
Headquarters, Washington
202-358-1600



NOTE TO EDITORS: #03-030

NASA STATEMENT ON LOSS OF COMMUNICATIONS WITH COLUMBIA


A Space Shuttle contingency has been declared in Mission Control, Houston, as a result of the loss of communication with the Space Shuttle Columbia at approximately 9 a.m. EST Saturday as it descended toward a landing at the Kennedy Space Center, Fla. It was scheduled to touchdown at 9:16 a.m. EST.


Communication and tracking of the shuttle was lost at 9 a.m. EST at an altitude of about 203,000 feet in the area above north central Texas. At the time communications were lost. The shuttle was traveling approximately 12,500 miles per hour (Mach 18). No communication and tracking information were received in
Mission Control after that time.

Search and rescue teams in the Dallas-Fort Worth and in portions of East Texas have been alerted. Any debris that is located in the area that may be related to the Space Shuttle contingency should be avoided and may be hazardous as a result of toxic propellants used aboard the shuttle. The location of any possible debris should immediately be reported to local authorities.

Flight controllers in Mission Control have secured all information, notes and data pertinent to today's entry and landing by Space Shuttle Columbia and continue to methodically proceed through contingency plans.

More information will be released as it becomes available.

OMG i can't believe this is happening. As soon as my parents heard what happened they called me this morning. I heard my voicemail beep, but rolled over and went back to bed. When I heard my dad's voicemail, all I could think was "OMG, something's wrong."

I'm in northern texas, and I didn't even know this happened until now. I haven't seen anything this bad since the Challenger.

tinydancer, are things with you ok?

Alphasig, I'm glad things in your part of northern texas are ok.

My prayers go out to everyone.

When I woke up just after 6 am PST this morning something told me to put the tv on not something I normally do that early on a Saturday morning. I started watching the TV and was just like - hmmm lets see if we went to war today something just doesn't seem right. I switched over to CBS and started watching the Early Show (I never watch it). Not even a couple of minutes later they break in with a special report and I'm thinking aw s--t we did go to war and then they said they had lost contact with Columbia 15 minutes ago. I kept hoping and praying for a miracle but when the first pictures started coming in the multiple contrails looked so eerily like Challenger. This is another one of those days where I'll always remember where I was and what I was doing when I heard the news.

I was trying to find the poem about something about Touching the Sky near the last stanzas of it that was read throughout the challenger disaster and memorials to post here but couldn't find it. It's as beautiful and as appropriate as the Air Force Hymn that was just posted. Hopefully if someone remembers what I'm talking about they can find the poem and post it here.

My prayers are for the families of all those affected and for the United States as we mourn this terrible loss

Reports from law enforcement personnel in Nacogdoches (nack-o-doches), Texas say pieces of the orbiter have landed in the area. Police and fire crews are securing sites at this time.

All NASA facilities are in lockdown, flags are at half-staff. More info as it becomes available.

An ongoing journal of the contingency is available at www.flatoday.com (Florida Today in Cocoa Beach, Florida is probably the best local newspaper covering space events.)

I just woke up to the news. I can remember being home from first grade the day Challenger exploded, and seeing that on TV. It just seems unreal. :(

Very tragic. Local weather stations are showing the debris cloud on their radars.

Anyone know what they're saying about the potential toxicity of the debris is true? Or is it just a lie to keep people from taking home souvenirs?

:(

I just learned about this... The astronauts and their families are in my thoughts and prayers.

I am too sad for words; what a horrible tragedy. My prayers are with the families.

No, this is quite true, between the fuel components and other materials used in the construction, contact with the chemicals/materials involved can be dangerous.

I used to work for the company that made/invented the material used to make the black heatproof tiles on the bottom of the shuttles.

It is true. The reaction control system and the Orbiting Maneuvering System pods which control the attitude of the orbiter use highly toxic, corrosive and hypergolic (burn on contact) fuels and oxidizers. The fuel is monomethyl hydrazine (MMH) and the oxidizer is nitrogen tetroxide (N2O4).

N204 is highly corrosive and toxic. When mixed with water, it turns into red-fuming nitric acid. MMH turns into a gas above 60 degrees Fahrenheit and is combustible. Whenever MMH and N2O4 are combined, they become hypergolic, or literally explode on contact with each other.

An accident at a Titan II ICBM complex (374-7, near Damascus, Arkansas) in 1980 was caused by a dropped socket wrench that struck the first stage fuel tank of a Titan II missile. While it did not immediately explode, as the fuel tank's contents emptied it's highly probable that the tank collapsed, causing the explosion. (Titan used Aerozine-50, which is similar to MMH, for its fuel).

The resulting explosion in the silo threw the 700-ton silo closure door several hundred yards away. The W-53 9-megaton thermonuclear warhead was recovered intact not far from the silo. Because of the many safety and security measures taken in the storage and arming of nuclear weapons, the warhead did not explode, nor were there any indications of radiation on the site.

Shortly after this accident, which killed one and injured many others, the 52 missile Titan II ICBM force was deactivated. The launchers have been converted into satellite boosters and the nuclear warheads placed in storage and apparently dismantled. The empty silos were blown up in place to comply with the START nuclear arms reduction treaty. Only one silo remains intact, this is 571-7 in Green Valley, Arizona, which is now the Titan Missile Museum Natonal Historic Landmark. In order for the site and missile not to be counted under START, the silor closure door has been permanently fixed to the half-open position and the missile in the silo (a ground training missile) has had holes opened in the fuel and oxidizer tanks and the reentry vehicle assembly. They were left out in the open for 90 days to allow for Russian spy satellites to verify that the missile was deactivated.

I am very sad and will keep everybody involved in my thoughts and prayers.

Reports coming in from East Texas say that debris from the orbiter as they are found are being mapped with GPS. This may help in the investigation of the orbiter's breakup.

I found out from my big sis this morning. She's a structural engineer at United Space Alliance on the Cape, and she actually tests the structural integrity of the orbiter. She is an absolute wreck. She was crying and talking about how she feels personally responsible even though Columbia isn't her bird (Endeavour actually is, in case anyone cared to know).

I'm still fairly new here, so a lot of you probably don't know a lot about me, but I'm an aerospace engineering major at Florida Tech, about 40 miles south of the Cape. AEs around here often switch to other majors, and someone asked me today if I was going to now since I had commented that grad school was starting to look more likely than getting a job. I just hope that the space program is still up and running when I graduate and for a long time afterward, because exploration is too important to give up just because an accident happens. We need to investigate the problems and make the shuttles, etc. safer for the men and women who fly on them.

Thank you to whoever pulled out the Gus Grissom quote. These men and women understood the risks, and accepted them. And in return, we will not forget them.

You're quite welcome. I've been an avid follower of space and aviation ever since I was very young. Way too young to remember Apollo 1 (I was only 2 at the time), but do remember the last flight of OV-099 (Challenger)as if it were yesterday.

Today was Bid Day at A&M, and whatever great feelings we had about the end of a successful rush were immediately tempered by the somber news we all recieved today.

I've got numerous brothers from East Texas, all of whom called home after hearing the news, some of their families have experienced the falling debris.

For the Aggies out there, y'all will understand when i respond with the following...

HERE.

Kitso
KS 361

My sister saw it...
 

I got a voice mail from my sister who lives in Houston. She is a speech thearpist at a school district there. She was going into work this am to help with soem adittional testing backlog that needed to be taken care of. She was on her way to work and saw what she thought was a metorite or space junk streaking across the sky. She didnt think it was the shuttle for several reasons; 1) She didnt know it was up. 2) We see the shuttle reenterign the earths atmosphere over texas a few times a year. You can see it almost anywhere in texas. At 300,000 to 200,000 ft in altitude its visible to most parts of Texas if the sky conditions are right. The meterologists on tv will often tell us when and where to look if we want to see it. So weve seen it several tiems before now. She said this didnt look anything like the other reentries. This one was different, with a wide smoke plume and "sparkely things" coming off it, leaving its own contrails. Thats why she didnt think it was the shuttle. Wild.

I absolutely hate days like this. Its one of those days of national tragedy that you will remember EXACTLY what you were doing and where you were when you heard the news for the rest of your life. I remember where I was and what I was doing when the Challenger exploded, When the Murrah bldg was bombed in 95, and when the WTC was bombed in 93 and of course the attacks of 911. Man I hate days like this. I feel bad for the families, but also for the people who work on the shuttle program. THe pride and effort those people put into it is amazing and to be at home thinking, "Did I cause this? Am I responsibe for the death of these 7 astronauts? Did I check and double check everyhting? Is there anything adittional I could have done? Should I have gone back and checked x, y, or z a fourth time, a fifth?" Damyn.

Also they are way serious about the pieces of the orbiter. Not only are the pieces potentially very dangerous as has been described above, but I am sure EVERYTHING is absolutely necessary to reconstuct the orbiter for failure analysys. I know they are serious because I have weatherbug on my computer here at work. It displays the temp down in the system tray and flashes if there is a storm warning or flood warning or something. Well I was working this early afternoon, and it starts flashing, meaning an alert is up for my area. I click on it and the following pops up:

BULLETIN - EAS ACTIVATION REQUESTED
CIVIL EMERGENCY MESSAGE
TEXAS DIVISION OF EMERGENCY MANAGEMENT AUSTIN TX
RELAYED BY NATIONAL WEATHER SERVICE AUSTIN/SAN ANTONIO TX
107 PM CST SAT FEB 1 2003

THE FOLLOWING MESSAGE IS TRANSMITTED AT THE REQUEST OF THE TEXAS
DEPARTMENT OF PUBLIC SAFETY.

...SPACE SHUTTLE DEBRIS...

CITIZENS SHOULD STAY AWAY FROM SPACE SHUTTLE DEBRIS AND REPORT
LOCATION OF DEBRIS TO LOCAL LAW ENFORCEMENT UNTIL FURTHER NOTICE.
AGAIN...CITIZENS SHOULD STAY AWAY FROM SPACE SHUTTLE DEBRIS.

SO I guess that means they are serious.

I pray for the space shuttle crew's family. I cant imagine havign to experience a private tragedy so publically.

The poem is called "High Flight" it was written by Officer Gillespie Magee, No 412 squadron, RCAF, Killed 11 December 1941.

It was read that the funerals of both my grandfather and dad, who were both pilots. Its a deeply personal poem to me and one of my favorites. I get emotional each time I read it.

Oh! I have slipped the surly bonds of earth
And danced the skies on laughter-silvered wings;
Sunward I've climbed, and joined the tumbling mirth
Of sun-split clouds - and done a hundred things
You have not dreamed of - wheeled and soared and swung
High in the sunlit silence. Hov'ring there
I've chased the shouting wind along, and flung
My eager craft through footless halls of air.
Up, up the long delirious, burning blue,
I've topped the windswept heights with easy grace
Where never lark, or even eagle flew -
And, while with silent lifting mind I've trod
The high unsurpassed sanctity of space,
Put out my hand and touched the face of God.

I HEARD it
 

I was reading the paper and heard this noise, sorta like a sonic boom. I got right up and looked out the window, wondering what it was. I thought it was just a big truck or something, but no one was on the street. I didn't have the radio or tv on, which is rare for me. Didn't think any more about it. I didn't find out about it until I was on the way to the nail salon and turned on the radio. One of the announcers said that he had heard it around 8:00 and then it all came together. AlphaSig, did you hear it in Plano? I'm in east Fort Worth and it was LOUD.
This is so sad. I remember when the Challenger exploded; I was at work and the school secretary came screaming into the library to tell me to turn on the tv.
My prayers to all the families.

Re: I HEARD it
 

Unfortunately, did not hear it in Plano... my mother called me to the TV when she heard the news. There was an unconfirmed report (mentioned earlier in this thread) that some debris did land in east Plano, about five miles from where I live.

I have seen the reentry of a Shuttle a few years back when I was living in San Antonio. Again, I never heard the sonic boom but we could easily see the 'fireball' and contrail as it zoomed across the San Antonio sky. San Antonio and Kennedy Space Center are approximately the same latitude (N 28 degrees).

I remember reading that the orbital inclination for this mission STS-107 was 39 degrees (the maximum orbital inclination from the Cape launches is 57.6 degrees; International Space Station missions are flown at 51.6).

OMG, lifesaver. That was also the poem for my father, a "flying doctor" whose plane crashed as he took off on his way to work. I couldn't hear it for years without dissolving in tears.

He was physician to many of the earliest astronauts--some of whom came to our house and several of whom died on the job. When they were killed, he reminded us that they died doing what they loved...when he died, at least I knew that he too had been doing what he loved.

I'm really sad about this. I just got back from our regional conclave and we were briefed by Israeli diplomats before a moment of silence. On board the shuttle was also Col. Ilan Ramon, Israel's first astronaut. http://www.nytimes.com/2003/02/02/in...al/02ISRA.html

This is just a horrible tragedy and I hurt for both Americans and Israelis.

-Rudey
--Upset

I just found out that David Brown is a cousin of a lady that I am related to...one of those "six degrees" relationships.

I was in Houston when the Challenger crashed. I was in one of the Houston hospitals' reception area, going to apply for a job. The way they were talking on the room's TV, at first I thought Reagan had died. It was a veryyy sad time to be in Houston.

Laurel Clark is from my hometown (Racine, Wisconsin) and is a longtime friend of my step-father.

Now that I've had some time to think about this, I've decided to post my thoughts. I apologize for the length, but space exploration is something of a passion and hobby for me and I feel very strongly about it.

As some of you may remember, I was a counselor at Space Camp this past summer. The camp is in Kansas, and has unprecedented rapport with NASA. Level III of the camp is one of the few student groups in the country that 1) has a regularly scheduled visit time or 2) that gets the type of access to facilities that we get. Because of this many of the people I worked with knew the astronauts or were within "one degree" of them. Personally, I know Jeff Ashbey who was commander of the Shuttle back in October so I'm one of those within one degree people, however many of the full time staff were much closer.

Anyways, it is safe to say that I have very good grasp of things and an understanding higher than the average layperson on the shuttle systems, and the way in which NASA thinks.

First of all, I think that unlike in Challenger, we will find that no one person or company will be able to be blamed. I think that the damage to the wing upon lift-off will be important...that's just my speculation. However, that means that Columbia was doomed to suffer this fate. There was no way of knowing the extent of the damage to the wing, particularly in the time period needed to order an abort of the mission (longest abort option time window is for the "Abort Once Around" or AOA which can be ordered at about 10 maybe 15 minutes after lift-off if even that long). As it has been said in various news outlets the Astronauts had no way of repairing the tiles once in space, and since the mission was solely dedicated to science, the robot arm was not in the payload bay. It appears to me that this was inevietable.

While this is a tragedy, and a thorough investigation needs to be done, I don't think that we can ground the shuttle for an extended period of time. After Challenger it was nearly 3 years until the next launch, such a hiatus now would absolutely halt all the progress that we have made with the Shuttle Program.

We are still dedicated to the International Space Station, and right now there are three men aboard. They can stay there until June and get home without any problems by using the Russian Soyuz capsule. However it is very important that humans continue to have a permanent presence in space. The science being done on ISS has major implications in a variety of areas. The potential to create medicines that can't be made on the ground due to gravity might be the most powerful ever created, capable of curing cancer, or alzheimers or who knows what else. The experiments in nanotechnology might further the miniaturization of our electronics.
To date over 20000 products have either been directly resultant of the space program or have been improved by technology developed by NASA. Everything from improving the absorbancy of disposable diapers (rip one open and add water to the crystals...sodium polyacrylate - direct from NASA) to computer technology, to food preservation have all been pioneered by NASA scientists and engineers.
One of the facts that my bosses told the campers was that for every $1 dollar spent on NASA $8 dollars are returned to the US Economy. Also less than half of one penny of one tax dollar in the US goes to the budget of NASA, so don't think you are putting a bunch of money in to a place that loses orbiters. You are spending way more money on building 'Star Wars' and Fighter planes that are ineffective in fighting terrorism (but are good for bombing Iraq).
In order to continue to benefit from the science on ISS it is important that the Shuttles start flying during this year. The rest of the missions this year are dedicated to construction on the ISS to increase it's ability as a science outpost.

Another thing to note. Last year Congress cut NASA's budget again, this time so much that we were only scheduled to fly 4 missions in 2003, down from 6 in 2002 that were scheduled. These numbers are down from the 14 that the shuttle fleet were flying in pre-Challenger years (14 is way too much, but it shows what was possible however it was unsafe). 4 missions a year!!! That's it, that alone is extending the construction schedule of the ISS by 3 more years most likely. If anything, to reap the rewards of space exploration there should be at least 6 launches a year.

I urge everyone to contact your Senators and Representatives urging them to support measures to fund NASA. Contact Senator Sam Brownback R-Kansas who is the chair of the Senate Sub-Commitee on Space, Science and Technology asking the same.

Finally, as I step off my soapbox, I'll close with a quote from Gus Grissom, America's second man in space who died in the Apollo I fire. I've talked to several astronauts and they agree with the statement fully. With these words, we should find the strength to carry on.

"If we die, we want people to accept it. We're in a risky business, and we hope that if anything happens to us it will not delay the program. The conquest of space is worth the risk of life."
-Gus Grissom

She's also a Gamma Phi Beta, from the Gamma chapter at Wisconsin...