Space Shuttle Columbia disaster: Difference between revisions

 

At 9:00:18, the orbiter began a catastrophic breakup, and all on-board data recording soon ceased.{{r|survival_report}}{{rp|1.20}} Ground observers noted a sudden increase in debris being shed, and all on-board systems lost power. By 9:00:25, the orbiter's fore and aft sections had separated from one another.{{r|survival_report}}{{rp|1.21}} The sudden [[Jerk (physics)|jerk]] caused the crew compartment to collide with the interior wall of the fuselage, resulting in a depressurization of the crew compartment by 9:00:35.{{r|survival_report}}{{rp|1.22}} The pieces of the orbiter continued to break apart into smaller pieces, and within a minute after breakup were too small to be detected by ground-based videos. By 9:35, all debris and crew remains were estimated to have hit the ground.{{r|survival_report}}{{rp|1.77}}

The loss of signal occurred at a time when the Flight Control Team expected brief communication outages as the orbiter stopped communication via the west [[tracking and data relay satellite]] (TDRS). Personnel in Mission Control were unaware of the in-flight break-up, and continued to try to reestablish contact with the orbiter.{{r|caib_report}}{{rp|43}} At approximately 9:06, when ''Columbia'' would have been conducting its final maneuvers to land, a Mission Control member received a phone call concerning news coverage of the orbiter breaking up. This information was passed on to the Entry Flight Director, [[LeRoy E. Cain|LeRoy Cain]], who initiated contingency procedures.{{r|caib_report}}{{rp|44}} At KSC, where ''Columbia'' had been expected to land at 9:16, NASA Associate Administrator and former astronaut [[William Readdy]] also began contingency procedures after the orbiter did not land as scheduled.{{r|columbia_home|p=5}}

=== Crew survivability ===

During reentry, all seven of the STS-107 crew members were killed, but the exact time of their deaths could not be determined. The level of acceleration that they experienced during crew module breakup was not lethal.{{r|caib_report}}{{rp|77}} The first lethal event the crew experienced was the [[Uncontrolled decompression|depressurization]] of the crew module. The rate and exact time of depressurization could not be determined, but occurred no later than 9:00:59. The remains of the crew members indicated they all experienced depressurization. The astronauts' helmets have a visor that, when closed, can temporarily protect the crew member from depressurization. Some of the crew members had not closed their visors, and one was not wearing a helmet; this would indicate that depressurization occurred quickly before they could take protective measures.{{r|survival_report|p=1.24}}<ref name="lossofsignal">{{cite book|last1=Stepaniak|first1=Philip C.|url=https://www.asma.org/asma/media/asma/Travel-Publications/NASA%20Shuttle/SP-2014-616.pdf|title=Loss of Signal: Aeromedical Lessons Learned from the STS-107 Columbia Space Shuttle Mishap|last2=Lane|first2=Helen W.|last3=Davis|first3=Jeffrey R.|date=May 2014|publisher=NASA|location=Washington, DC|access-date=March 10, 2022|archive-date=March 3, 2022|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20220303191229/http://www.asma.org/asma/media/asma/Travel-Publications/NASA%20Shuttle/SP-2014-616.pdf|url-status=live}}</ref>{{rp|103}}