On February 1st 2003, NASA's first operational space shuttle, Columbia, an orbiter with over
22 years of service disintegrated nearing the conclusion of its 28th mission killing all seven crew members on board. This occurred whilst re-entering the atmosphere over Texas, intending to land at Florida’s Kennedy Space Centre. Subsequent investigations, determined the disaster was predominantly caused by a failure which occurred seconds after the January
16 launch. Remnants of the shuttles foam insulation broke off from the external fuel tank and at extreme speeds the shuttle collided with the foam, the impact damaging the shuttle’s left wing, a failure left unsolved over the course of the short research mission.[1] During re-entry the hole in the …show more content…
Immediately was seen the postponement of the space shuttle program in Columbia’s aftermath for 2 years, whilst NASA conveyed the CAIB, whom subsequently released detailed incident reports, pertaining criticism of the minimization of safety issues at NASA over the years. The disaster also shook NASA out of the complacency it had fallen into, prompting a serious revaluation of their notions of acceptable levels of risk, with comparison to 1986 Challenger explosion coming into play, CAIB notes on the similarities are that “both accidents were ‘failures of foresight’” and the parallels between the failures demonstrates
“the causes of the institutional failure responsible for Challenger had not been fixed”; and that “if these persistent, systemic flaws are not resolved, the scene is set for another accident”
Following shift in perspective, the disaster also catalysed changes in design and procedure. procedures were implemented to better facilitate safety precautions. For instance, camera views were designated on the orbiter prior to launch to better monitor the foam shedding,
22 years of service disintegrated nearing the conclusion of its 28th mission killing all seven crew members on board. This occurred whilst re-entering the atmosphere over Texas, intending to land at Florida’s Kennedy Space Centre. Subsequent investigations, determined the disaster was predominantly caused by a failure which occurred seconds after the January
16 launch. Remnants of the shuttles foam insulation broke off from the external fuel tank and at extreme speeds the shuttle collided with the foam, the impact damaging the shuttle’s left wing, a failure left unsolved over the course of the short research mission.[1] During re-entry the hole in the …show more content…
Immediately was seen the postponement of the space shuttle program in Columbia’s aftermath for 2 years, whilst NASA conveyed the CAIB, whom subsequently released detailed incident reports, pertaining criticism of the minimization of safety issues at NASA over the years. The disaster also shook NASA out of the complacency it had fallen into, prompting a serious revaluation of their notions of acceptable levels of risk, with comparison to 1986 Challenger explosion coming into play, CAIB notes on the similarities are that “both accidents were ‘failures of foresight’” and the parallels between the failures demonstrates
“the causes of the institutional failure responsible for Challenger had not been fixed”; and that “if these persistent, systemic flaws are not resolved, the scene is set for another accident”
Following shift in perspective, the disaster also catalysed changes in design and procedure. procedures were implemented to better facilitate safety precautions. For instance, camera views were designated on the orbiter prior to launch to better monitor the foam shedding,