A Columbia Culprit?
By Jeffrey Kluger
NASA investigators made a major breakthrough last week in their investigation of the Columbia disaster, determining that the shuttle's breakup may have been caused by plasma--superhot gas--leaking into the ship's wheel well. The revelation came as a surprise to many, but not to longtime NASA watchers. They had heard a similar story almost 40 years before.
On Jan. 30, 1964, the cameras in the unmanned Ranger 6 moon probe were blinded during lift-off when plasma seeped into the booster. The failure of the mission caused a sensation at the time, and the space agency took measures to shield its camera systems. How could the new NASA get burned by such an old enemy? Two engineers who submitted reports to the nine-member crash investigation board told TIME last week they believe the problems may be more institutional than technical. With budgets tight, safety protocols may have been allowed to erode over time. When problems or anomalies were spotted, administrators may have been too quick to dismiss them as non-life-threatening.
If plasma is indeed responsible, it couldn't have done it alone. It needed to make its way through an existing breach in Columbia's aluminum skin. How could that coat have been punctured? There are still only theories, but here is what we do know: new temperature records reveal that the heat in the left wheel well began to increase when the shuttle was still over the Pacific, heading for California. That suggests the ship sustained damage in orbit, but began to feel the effects only when the temperature rose during re-entry. "In a large number of cases," says retired Admiral Harold Gehman, head of the investigation board, "what you find in the end has no bearing on what you thought you had in the beginning." That would include a problem that first bit NASA four decades ago--one that this time didn't just damage a robot ship but took seven lives. --By Jeffrey Kluger. With reporting by Broward Liston/Cape Canaveral
With reporting by Broward Liston/Cape Canaveral