6. James Hull email to all Texas Forest Service personnel, February 14, 2003.
7. Interviews with Dave King and Scott Wells.
8. Interviews with Mike Alexander.
9. “Shuttle Probe Exhausting,” Florida Today, March 3, 2003, 3A.
10. “More Debris to Arrive at KSC Today,” Florida Today, March 4, 2003, 2A.
11. Keller, USDA Forest Service Role, 44.
12. Texas Interagency Coordination Center, “Update—Space Shuttle Columbia Response,” internal memo, February 14, 2003.
13. Southwest Texas Debriefing Team, “Space Shuttle Columbia Recovery Teams: A Grateful Nation Says ‘Thank You,’” pamphlet distributed to incoming fire crews at Longview, TX, February 2003.
14. Keller, USDA Forest Service Role, 46.
15. Greg Cohrs email to Jonathan Ward.
16. Jerry Ross email to Jonathan Ward. The NASA astronauts who shared the “ground boss” role were Jim Halsell, Alan Poindexter, Bob Behnken, and Mike Foreman. Astronauts rotated during the recovery period to keep from getting worn out.
17. Greg Cohrs email to Jonathan Ward.
18. Interview with Gerry Schumann.
19. Shafer and LeConey. “Legal Issues,” 79–82. NASA reviewed 153 property damage claims and provided compensation totaling $89,407. While many claims were legitimate, many were spurious. A typical example of the latter was one man who claimed that burning shuttle debris had set fire to his fishing pier, where in fact his barbeque grill had clearly caused the damage. The largest legal claim against NASA was by Spacehab, seeking $87.7 million in damages for loss of the research double module. Spacehab withdrew the claim in February 2007. “Spacehab Drops Columbia Lawsuit Against NASA; Says Efforts Better Spent Elsewhere,” Aero News Network, February 22, 2007.
20. Cohrs, “Notes,” 17.
21. Toward the end of the search period, the Forest Service set up a temporary helicopter base at Ennis, between Dallas and Corsicana.
22. Jerry Ross email to Jonathan Ward.
23. Interview with Boo Walker.
24. US Navy, Salvage Report, 2–4.
25. Jerry Ross email to Jonathan Ward. NASA’s water search coordinators were astronauts Jim Reilly, Steve Bowen, and Keith Russell, assisted by a coast guard officer on loan to the Flight Crew Operations Directorate.
26. Texas Forest Service, “Situation Report Sunday Supplement: The Week in Review, April 13-20, 2003,” internal memo.
27. Greg Cohrs email to Jonathan Ward.
28. US Navy, Salvage Report, sections 2–5.
29. Cohrs “Notes,” 16.
30. “KSC Managers Visit East Texas Recovery Team,” Spaceport News (Kennedy Space Center, FL), March 21, 2003, 1.
31. “Primary Search for Columbia Material Passes Halfway Mark,” news release H03-117, March 25, 2003.
32. Interview with René Arriëns.
33. Gerry Schumann said that Pat Adkins was renowned for his ability to identify just about any piece of debris. The collection team occasionally amused themselves by tossing random pieces of metal, such as tractor parts, into the box. Adkins would pick them up, turn them over once in his hand, and ask, “Okay, who’s the wiseass?”
34. Interview with René Arriëns.
35. Greg Cohrs emails to Jonathan Ward.
36. Interview with Jeremy Willoughby; Greg Cohrs emails to Jonathan Ward. While several other searchers from the Western United States claim to have discovered the OEX box, Cohrs’s work plans from the day confirm that two Florida fire crews—Florida 3 and Florida 4—were working in the area the day the box was discovered.
37. Greg Cohrs email to Jonathan Ward.
38. William Harwood, “Recovered Data Tape in Relatively Good Condition,” article for CBS News Space Place, reprinted in Spaceflight Now, March 24, 2003, www.spaceflightnow.com/shuttle/sts107/030324tape/.
39. Texas Forest Service, “Space Shuttle Columbia Recovery Efforts,” internal memo, March 19, 2003.
40. Texas Forest Service, “Columbia Disaster Response 2003: NWCG Resources Mobilized Through Texas Interagency Coordination Center,” March 24, 2003.
Chapter 10: Their Mission Became Our Mission
1. Interview with Jim Furr.
2. Interview with Pat Adkins.
3. Kenneth Ward email to Jonathan Ward.
4. Interview with Boo Walker.
5. Christopher Freeze, “The ‘Columbia’ Debris Recovery Helo Crash, March 27, 2003,” www.check-six.com/Crash_Sites/STS107-N175PA.htm.
6. Greg Cohrs email to Jonathan Ward.
7. Interview with Ed Mango.
8. Freeze, “Debris Recovery Helo Crash.”
9. Interview with Ed Mango.
10. Freeze, “Debris Recovery Helo Crash.”
11. Interview with Jeff Angermeier.
12. Interview with Ed Mango.
13. FEMA, “Space Shuttle Columbia; Emergency and Related Determinations,” news releases FEMA-3171-EM-TX and FEMA-3172-EM-LA and situation report 59, April 7, 2003.
14. NASA, “Columbia Recovery Visit to Nacogdoches Incident Command Site and Lufkin, Agenda for STS-114 Crew,” NASA Public Affairs Office (Johnson Space Center) internal memo, April 10, 2003.
15. Stacy Faison, “Shuttle Crew Visits East Texas,” Lufkin Daily News, April 11, 2003.
16. NASA, “Columbia Recovery Agenda for Family Visit,” internal memo, April 23, 2003.
17. Interview with Brent Jett.
18. US Navy, Salvage Report, 5-2.
19. Cohrs, “Notes,” 19.
20. NASA, Report CB-QMS-024, 9.
21. USDA Forest Service, “Fire and Aviation Management Briefing Paper, Columbia Support, Interagency Support to Space Shuttle Columbia Recovery Effort,” USDA Forest Service, Washington, DC, May 2, 2003.
22. Jan Amen email, April 30, 2003.
23. “Columbia Shuttle Recovery Appreciation Program” (Lufkin, TX: April 29, 2003), program agenda.
24. Interview with Boo Walker.
25. US Navy, Salvage Report, 5–6, B-1.
26. FEMA, “Recap of the Search for Columbia Shuttle Material,” news release 3171-EM NR071, May 5, 2003.
27. Mark Stanford, “STS-107 Space Shuttle Columbia Recovery Operation, February 1–May 10, 2003,” PowerPoint presentation (undated); David King and Scott “Doc” Horowitz, “Space Shuttle Columbia Recovery Operation,” (Washington, DC: March 8, 2013), presentation to Space Policy Institute Symposium. https://www.c-span.org/video/?311395-3/space-shuttle-columbia-recovery-operation.
Chapter 11: Reconstructing Columbia
1. Interview with Steve Altemus.
2. Interview with Steve Altemus.
3. NASA, untitled video on lessons learned in Columbia reconstruction with Steve Altemus and Pam Melroy, July 2003 (unreleased).
4. Pam Melroy, NASA reconstruction video.
5. Michelle La Vone, “The Space Shuttle Challenger Disaster,” Space Safety Magazine, January 28, 2016, www.spacesafetymagazine.com/space-disasters/challenger-disaster/.
6. Robert Pearlman, “Smithsonian Considering Display of Fallen Shuttles Challenger and Columbia Debris,” collectSPACE.com, January 31, 2011, www.collectspace.com/news/news-013111a.html.
7. Interview with John Biegert.
8. Interview with Jim Comer.
9. Interviews with Jim Comer and Jon Cowart.
10. Pam Melroy, in NASA reconstruction video.
11. “Schirra, Lovell Cheer KSC Workers,” Spaceport News, March 21, 2003, 7.
12. Interview with Pat Adkins.
13. Interview with Jim Comer.
14. Interviews with Steve Altemus and Pam Melroy.
15. “Panel Confident of Finding Cause,” Florida Today, March 19, 2003, 2A.
16. NASA, Columbia Accident Investigation Board Report, Vol. 1 (Washington, DC, August 2003), 75.
17. Interview with Marty McLellan.
18. Shafer and LeConey. “Legal Issues,” 56–7.
19. “Student Science Project Survived Shuttle Disaster,”
CNN, May 24, 2003. Quoted in Liston, Chronology of KSC for 2003, 111.
20. NASA reconstruction video.
21. CAIB Report, 75.
22. CAIB Report, 76.
23. CAIB Report, 75.
24. NASA reconstruction video.
Chapter 12: Healing and Closure
1. Sean O’Keefe email to Mike Leinbach and Jonathan Ward.
2. Interviews with Ann Micklos, Pam Melroy, and John Biegert. Biegert said that many of the digital timers used by the crew survived reentry and were recovered in working order, although their displays were fogged over.
3. Interview with Jim Wetherbee.
4. Jeff Williams, interviewed by Connie Hodges.
5. CAIB Report, 61.
6. Jim Comer noted that Enterprise was at the time being prepared for exhibit in the Udvar-Hazy Center of the Smithsonian’s National Air and Space Museum. Pam Melroy and Comer traveled to Washington and negotiated with museum director Gen. J. R. “Jack” Dailey for a loan of the leading edge panels and the landing gear door. As a side note, Enterprise did not have thermal tiles, since it was not intended to fly in space. NASA glued tiles to Enterprise’s landing gear door to simulate an operational shuttle for these tests.
7. Interview with Steve Altemus.
8. Interview with Robert Hanley.
9. “Debris Reconstruction Hangar Walk-through Days Scheduled,” Spaceport News, June 27, 2003, 2.
10. “Texas Family Recalls Recovery Contributions,” Spaceport News, September 5, 2003, 4.
Chapter 13: Preserving and Learning from Columbia
1. Robert Pearlman, “Smithsonian Considering Display.”
2. Interview with Mike Ciannilli.
3. Interview with Scott Thurston.
4. “Storage of Columbia Debris to be Determined,” Spaceport News, July 11, 2003, 2.
5. Interview with Scott Thurston.
6. “Columbia Tank Found on Lakebed,” NASA online article, August 3, 2011, https://www.nasa.gov/mission_pages/shuttle/main/columbiatankfound.html.
7. “Columbia Debris Finds Final Home in VAB,” Spaceport News, October 31, 2003, 2.
8. “VAB 16th Floor A Tower Is Columbia’s Arlington,” Spaceport News, February 13, 2004, 5.
9. STS-121 mission summary, https://www.nasa.gov/mission_pages/shuttle/shuttlemissions/archives/sts-121.html.
10. Interviews with Mike Leinbach and Mike Ciannilli.
11. Interviews with Jim Comer and Steve Altemus.
12. NASA, Crew Survival Investigation Report, 4–5.
13. Pam Melroy email to Jonathan Ward; NASA, Crew Survival Investigation Report 3-69–3-70.
Chapter 14: The Beginning of the End
1. NASA, “Expedition 6 Crew Returns Home,” May 3, 2003, https://www.nasa.gov/missions/shuttle/soyuz_landing_update.html.
2. Jim Banke, “NASA’s O’Keefe Promises Study of Safety Reporting System,” Space.com, May 22, 2003, quoted in Liston, KSC Chronology of KSC for 2003, 109–10.
3. CAIB Report, 118.
4. “Inquiry costs taxpayers $454 million,” Florida Today, August 26, 2003, 1A, 5A.
5. Wayne Hale notes to Mike Leinbach.
6. Hubble orbits at 28.5° inclination and 335 miles altitude; the ISS orbit is 51° inclination and 250 miles altitude.
7. Space Telescope Science Institute, “Servicing Mission 4 Cancelled,” status report January 15, 2004, www.spaceref.com/news/viewsr.html?pid=11615.
8. NASA, “NASA Approves Mission and Names Crew for Return to Hubble,” news release 06-343, October 31, 2006.
9. “Investigation Could Reshape Space Agency,” Florida Today, March 3, 2003, 3A, quoted in Liston, KSC Chronology of KSC for 2003, 52.
10. “Designer: Suspend Human Space Program,” Florida Today, May 16, 2003, 11A, quoted in Liston, KSC Chronology of KSC for 2003, 109–10.
11. The International Space Station Intergovernmental Agreement is an international treaty signed on January 29, 1998, by fifteen governments for “a long term international co-operative frame-work on the basis of genuine partnership, for the detailed design, development, operation, and utilisation of a permanently inhabited civil Space Station for peaceful purposes, in accordance with international law.”
12. “Return ASAP,” Aviation Week & Space Technology, September 29, 2003, 21.
13. Andrew Thomas, “Exploration—To the Fire of the Human Spirit: A Tribute to Fallen Astronauts and Cosmonauts,” August 4, 2005, https://www.nasa.gov/returntoflight/crew/sts114_exp11_tribute.html.
14. FEMA’s Scott Wells and Mark Stanford of the Texas Forest Service, among many others who participated in the Columbia recovery, were also involved in responding to the aftermath of Hurricane Katrina. While lessons learned from the Columbia operation actually improved the coordination among many of the agencies during the Katrina response, leadership breakdowns in other areas is a topic best discussed elsewhere.
15. Warren Leary, “Cracks Found in Protective Foam on an Unused Shuttle Fuel Tank,” New York Times, November 23, 2005.
16. Wayne Hale, “How We Nearly Lost Discovery,” Wayne Hale’s Blog, April 18, 2012, https://waynehale.wordpress.com/2012/04/18/how-we-nearly-lost-discovery/.
17. “Bird Droppings Survive Space Launch,” Washington Post, July 5, 2006, http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2006/07/05/AR2006070501242.html.
18. Justin Ray, “NASA Space Shuttle Launch Director Joins Commercial Rocket Company,” Space.com, January 24, 2012, www.space.com/14333-shuttle-launch-director-leinbach-joins-ula.html.
Chapter 15: Celebrating 25,000 Heroes
1. National Park Service, Space Shuttle Columbia Memorial Special Resource Study, National Park Service Intermountain Region (Denver, CO: October 2014), 86.
2. National Park Service, Columbia Memorial Resource Study, 9.
3. A few other pieces of Columbia debris are in display cases in administrative buildings at NASA Centers. For example, the crew hatch window is in the KSC Headquarters Building, and the OEX recorder is at JSC. These locations are not typically accessible to the general public, however. Mike Ciannilli was instrumental in obtaining approval to exhibit the hatch and hatch cover from the Apollo 1 spacecraft, which can be seen at KSC’s Apollo/Saturn V Visitors Center.
4. Cohrs, “Notes,” 2.
INDEX
accident, cause of, 233, 247, 258–259
Adkins, Patrick
emotional aftershock, 240
on emotions about spacecraft, 13–14
finds pieces of Spacehab experiments, 186, 228
at Hemphill debris collection center, 114
investigates “hot” tank, 147
as KSC quality control inspector, 144–145
last day at Hemphill, 202–203
nose landing gear, 183–185
encounter with swamp gas, 178
search on horseback, 156–157
volunteers in Atlantis building, 282–283
aerial crews, searchers, 180–181
Agency Contingency Action Plan for Space Flight Operations, 47, 55–56
Air Force Maui Optical and Supercomputer Site (AMOS), 32
Alabama Gulf Strike Team, 104
Alexander, Mike, 119, 131–132
Allen, Mark, 67, 109, 111, 283–284
Alliant Aviation, 163
Alpha Magnetic Spectrometer, 277–278
Altemus, Steve
emotional response of reconstruction team, 219–220
escorts families through hangar, 247
lessons learned, 286
manages reconstruction effort, 155–156, 206–210
Manatees tailgate party, 244
rapid organization of reconstruction effort, 206–207, 216
KSC staff visits to hangar, 249–250
selects debris for display in Preservation Office, 260
Amen, Jan, 64–65, 101, 116, 134, 201, 203–204
Anderson, Lt. Col. Michael, 10, 23–24, 237, 292–293
Angelina National Forest, 195
>
Angermeier, Jeff, 241
Apache (helicopter) video, Columbia disintegration, 158–159
Apache (Native American tribe), 192
Apollo, Challenger, and Columbia Lessons Learned Program, 282
Apollo 1, 256
Apollo Saturn V Visitors Center, 210
Ares I-X, 277
Armed Forces Institute of Pathology, 88–90, 117
Arriëns, René, 176–179, 186–187, 240, 242
Ashby, Jeff, 125
Astronaut Office, 61, 210
Astronaut beach house, 16–17
Astrovan, 20
Atlantis
final mission, 278–279
fuel system and stand down, 15
as part of shuttle fleet, 8
and rescue of Columbia crew, 267–269
retired, 279
STS-27, lands badly damaged, 29, 34
STS-125, final Hubble servicing mission, 270
test panels from wings, 246
Awtonomow, Debbie, 176, 179, 184–186
Ayish Bayou, 196
Bagian, James, 116–117
Bailey, Bill, 61
Ball, Terry, 68
Bank of America building, Lufkin command post, 172
Barksdale Air Force Base
debris collection management moved to Lufkin, 140, 172
as debris logistics and processing center, 141, 148, 153, 159, 164–166, 206–209, 216
establishing operations, 83–84
Feb. 8 memorial service, 157
as MIT strategic command center, 63, 70, 78–79, 174
RRT deployment to, 85–86, 88, 104, 151–152
temporary morgue, 90, 117
Bayou Bend Road, 143
Bean, Olen, 67, 97, 168
Beard, Marcus, 119, 168
Bell 407 helicopter, 195–198
Benzon, Robert, 88–90, 104–105
Biegert, John, 211, 214, 248
“black boxes,” 89. See also Orbiter Experiment system recorder
Blackfoot, 192
Blue Bell Company, 142
Borsi, Mark, 19, 85, 90
Boeing, 12, 30, 207, 212, 231, 249
Bowen, Steve, 96
Bowersox, Kenneth, 264
Breznik, Greg, 188–189
Bridges, Roy, 39, 46, 56, 207, 248, 273
“broomstraw fracturing,” 225
Brown, Cpt. Dave, 10–11, 20, 53–54, 211–212, 237, 293
Brown, Doug, 237
Brown, Michael, 160
Bringing Columbia Home Page 34
