Space Shuttle Columbia 20 Years Later - A Look Back
Space Shuttle Columbia STS-107 crew members
Commander Rick Husband; pilot William McCool; mission specialists Michael Anderson, David Brown, Kalpana Chawla, and Laurel Clark; and payload specialist Ilan Ramon
Columbia’s First Launch back in 1981 - on that day, it became the first reusable manned spacecraft to travel into space
It was against this backdrop on the morning of Saturday, Feb. 1, 2003, that the Space Shuttle Columbia was lost just 15 minutes before it was scheduled to land at Cape Canaveral. It was the 28th mission for the reusable Columbia, which had inaugurated the shuttle program in 1981, and the 107th overall shuttle mission for NASA.
News broke just after 6 a.m. Pacific Time that NASA had “lost contact” with the Space Shuttle Columbia somewhere over Texas. The notion of “losing contact” with a spacecraft, especially one that lands like a glider, was difficult to reconcile and not like any NASA mission anyone could recall.
The shuttle had broken up somewhere over Texas. NASA explains the circumstantial reason behind the incident, foam from the shuttle’s external tank fell off, causing a hole in the left wing and while returning to Earth the shuttle broke up in the air.
The explosion occurred due to a damaged left wing of the space shuttle which had a hole in it, caused by a piece of polyurethane Foam (avoids any type of ice freezing on the tank).
Polyurethane foam was applied to an external fuel tank which had liquid hydrogen and oxygen in it. A six-to-ten-inch-diameter piece of this foam fell off the external tank and created a hole in the shuttle’s left wing.
Unaware of the damage, the astronauts headed back to Earth atmosphere. The wing hole came into action and penetrated with the heat shield, ending up destroying the wing’s internal structure. This damage induced the shuttle to become unstable and explode.
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The Shuttle Breaking up
Debris From The Shuttle
May we always remember these Military Personnel, Astronauts, and Heroes: Commander Rick Husband - Pilot William C. McCool - Payload Commander Micheal P. Anderson - Mission Specialist Kalpana Chawala - Mission Specialist David M. Brown - Mission Specialist Laurel Clark - Mission Specialist Ilan Ramon
Credit: NASA, AP
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ORANGE, Texas — The uncle of Lance Cpl. Shane Goldman said it was his nephew’s dream to become a Marine.
“Ever since he could walk and talk, he wanted to be a Marine. He made it,” Neal Davis told close to 1,000 mourners gathered at North Orange Baptist Church for the funeral of the 19-year-old, who died April 5 in Iraq.
Davis, a 61-year-old retired Marine, told the mourners that the last time he saw his nephew was three days before Goldman shipped out for duty in Japan and later for his second tour in Iraq.
During a conversation that lasted for more than an hour at a restaurant outside the gates of Camp Pendleton, Calif., Davis said Goldman told him he was worried he might not make it home a second time.
“He knew it was tough, he’d gone to Iraq one time,” Davis said. “He said, ‘Uncle Neal, I have a bad feeling about this.’ I told him to keep his head down.”
“He started to walk away and then turned back with that little grin and said, ‘I’m not sure how bad it’s going to be, but tell the family I’ll try not to let them down,”’ Davis said. Emotion thickening his voice, Davis said, “He didn’t.”
Goldman, who leaves behind a fianc©e, attended Little Cypress-Mauriceville High School and graduated from Parkview Baptist High School in Louisiana before joining the Marine Corps in 2002.
The Marine’s father, George “Scooter” Goldman of St. Croix in the U.S. Virgin Islands, said that when Shane was growing up he used to kiss his father goodbye on the phone.
In the last call he received from his son, Shane told Scooter how different this mission felt from the first time he was in Iraq and kissed him goodbye on the phone again.
“He told me that they (the Iraqis) don’t like us like they did the first time,” Goldman said.
Goldman’s flag-draped casket was carried from the church by an honor guard of Marines. The funeral procession was led through Orange by an escort of more than 20 police, sheriff’s and emergency services vehicles with their lights flashing.
Goldman was buried with full military honors.
– 1st Battalion, 5th Marines, 1st Marine Division Marine Expeditionary Force - Geronimo –
Credit via the Associated Press: https://thefallen.militarytimes.com/marine-lance-cpl-shane-l-goldman/257147
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