It is remarkable at how badly NASA handled this, and this article lays it out in simple terms. The families of the crew, as well as anyone in this country (and Israel, for that matter), have every right to be furious. http://msnbc.msn.com/id/4095664/
http://www.theatlantic.com/unbound/interviews/int2003-10-22.htm I found this interview w/William Langewiesche to be very informative as well.
I had no idea there were so many opportunities to inspect the problem and determine the stability of the spacecraft. I had no idea a rescue was even possible. Shows what happens when you just believe what you are told and don't do any research.
For those with interest, I would urge you to download the Columbia Accident Investigation Board report and read all of it, or certainly chunks of it. It is probably one of the best technical and analytical reports ever produced. The bottom line: even after Challenger, NASA is still an organization that does not have a "safety" culture. For them, the #1 priority is to execute missions, because executing missions is how you maintain your funding. And with funding tight, too little goes to issues of safety, with the vast majority of dollars going to operational activities. This leads to the attitude, when those who are concerned about safety are met with this demand from the operational folks: "Prove to me in fact that the situation is dangerous. If you can't conclusively prove it is dangerous, then we keep flying." This instead of the opposite approach they SHOULD take, where the skeptics demand from the operational folks. "prove to me conclusively it is NOT dangerous. If you can't, then we stop, or we takes steps to find out, and if we can, fix it." Twice, the former mentality has led to $2 billion flushed down the toilet, and, more significantly, the lives of 14 astronauts snuffed out.
have you ever read the "lost" transcript of the challenger crew? they went through agony. they were all screaming, saying the lord's prayer, etc. i enjoyed that immensely.at least they've got no worries, right?
see www.rickadams.org/chall/ that has the transcript that nasa hid from the public. it is a beautiful thing to read.
the one year anniversary of this crash surely should make people ralixe that interstellar space travel is impossible. think of how difficult it is to fly the shuttle. how could any civilization, assuming there are any other intelligent civilizations out there, develop technology like that? no way. i don't belive that ufo's are alien spaceships and i never will
i find the possibility of the crew being aware of their fate fascinating. i have read about this subject after i saw the link i posted last year. the question is whether or not the cabin depressurized right away. if it did, then they were all knocked out right away. but nasa has never said that they conclusively couls determine that this occurred. in fact, it has been determined that at least 2 astronauts pulled their emergency oxygen supply cords. that is a fact. the additional transcript supposedly came from krista mcauliffe's helmet. you see, each astronaut has a tape recorder attached to their helmets. they do not automatically operate. they must be switched on by the astronaut. and her helmet was found intact, along with this tape. that is the basis of the story.
Dude, according to that link the transcript addition was originally published in Weekly World News. The same publication that brought to light the plight of Bat Boy and explained to us that space aliens visit earth because they like Krispy Kreme donuts.
right, but i have spent time researching nasa's official investigation on this matter. and they have not ever been able to claim (and you know they would like to) that the cabin was depressurized right away. if you recall, the explosion did not kill the astronauts. the cabin was thrown from the rest of the craft. actually, the shuttle did not "explode," it broke apart into pieces. if the cabin did not deppressurize then the astronauts would have been conscious for at least part of the ride down. and since at least 2 perhaps more of the air masks had been activated, some of them survived the initial break up of the shuttle. that is fact, not weekly world news stuff