The Horizon Guide to Space Shuttles

A remarkable chapter in space flight ended

when the Space Shuttle launched for the final time.

Since the early 1980s, the Shuttle has been the pinnacle of manned spaceflight technology.

Columbia is a beautiful ship. She's performing magnificently.

Horizon and the BBC have covered every step of its story.

A mission of 37 orbits going east from the Cape out over the Atlantic...

Over the last 30 years

the Shuttle has contributed to some dazzling scientific achievements.

Hey!

Oh!

Wow!

But the successes have been overshadowed by tragedy.

He said, "I don't see her. I don't see the Shuttle." I said, "It's gone." And it was.

You just knew it was... You knew.

Now that it's all over, how will the Space Shuttle be remembered?

As a great adventure in human space exploration?

Or as a fatally-flawed white elephant?

In the early days of the Shuttle programme, each launch was a thrilling event for America

and for the astronauts involved.

There's a period of time up on the launch pad where you're standing

with all the searchlights playing up on the Shuttle.

And here is this monster that you're about to climb into.

Because it's fully-fuelled and there's a certain amount of boil off of the liquid oxygen and so forth,

it seems like it's a hissing, breathing, alive machine.

The voice communications become

quite silent in the last minutes. You hear the counting down

and the main engines come on.

Of course, that's about, I guess,

1.25 million pounds of thrust.

You get that kick in the pants and you're up, up and away.

We're going something over about 100mph by the time we reach the top of the tower.

You're just sitting there hoping like heck that nothing happens to any of the engines

because your mind's thinking all the time. "What do I look for?

"What do I need to be ready to do?"

This strange, loud, roaring staccato is somehow punctuated

by another sound of an explosion.

That's the solid rockets being released.

It looks like you're flying through a fireball when those things go off.

After that point, it's very smooth.

The whole experience is just a tremendous adventure.

I smiled from ear to ear right when the engines went off

and said, "What an experience! Let's go back and do that again!"

MUSIC: "Hail To The Chief"

Americans were deeply proud of their new space programme.

CHEERING

The Shuttle was a symbol of the very best of American ingenuity.

'Ladies and gentlemen, the President of the United States and Mrs Reagan

'and astronauts Mattingly and Hartsfield.'

The fourth landing of the Columbia marks our entrance into a new era.

The test flights are over. The groundwork has been laid.

Beginning with the next flight, the Columbia and her sister ships will be fully operational.

The excitement echoed the celebration of the Apollo programme decades before

where the story of the Shuttle begins.

'We're go for landing. Eagle, you're go for landing. Over.'

'Tranquility Base here. The Eagle has landed.'

The American space agency, NASA, had achieved a remarkable triumph

in getting men to the Moon and back.

But even as the ticker tape fell, NASA was in trouble. The Moon shot had cost 25 billion.

It didn't take long for the public and politicians to question the price tag of future space travel.

The space programme needed to be cheaper.

Many at NASA had long dreamed of building a reusable craft,

a sleek, futuristic space plane,

which would launch into orbit off the back of a vast winged booster.

Both vehicles would be able to land on a standard runway.

Though reusable, this design was still too costly.

So in 1970, NASA was obliged to seek support from the Air Force,

which had already experimented with rocket planes that could skim the edge of space.

The Air Force agreed to collaborate,

but only if NASA made the space plane big enough to carry hefty spy satellites.

The Shuttle as we know it was born,

the main vehicle an enormous delta-winged orbiter,

its vast body covered in a patchwork of heat-resistant tiles

which allow it to withstand the intense heat of re-entry.

Too big to launch off the back of a booster plane,

the orbiter is instead mated with a central fuel tank

flanked by two solid rockets which provide the thrust to take it into orbit.

By 1972, the Shuttle's distinctive design was set,

though not everyone approved.

We have a vehicle which rests on a huge tank

which has 750,000 gallons of fuel.

And then there are these two great solid rocket boosters, 150 feet long, strapped on either side of it.

And the orbiter sits on top.

That's the equivalent of riding a broomstick made of dynamite with two firecrackers on either side.

Despite the misgivings of some, Space Shuttle Columbia was finally ready to go on April 12th, 1981.

20 years to the day after Russia's Yuri Gagarin first orbited the Earth.

From the start, NASA planned to make Shuttle flights routine

with launches every two weeks.

To help fund this ambitious schedule, crews would work with commercial satellites.

New ones would be deployed and old ones fixed when they broke.

In April, 1984, the Shuttle faced its first major challenge

to show that it was worth the billions it had cost.

Its mission was to repair the faulty electronics in a satellite called Solar Max.

But first, astronaut George "Pinky" Nelson had to catch it.

'Nelson on his way. One hour and two minutes.

'You'll have to hold on to it with both hands, I imagine.'

Unable to dock properly with Solar Max, Nelson tried to stop the satellite spinning...with his hands.

'If you could go in that hole, that would be fine.'

Nelson's efforts only made Solar Max tumble faster. It seemed a failure.

Happily, though, controllers managed to slow the spinning satellite

enough for the Shuttle to manoeuvre alongside and attempt to grab Solar Max with its robot arm.

- 'OK, we've got it' - Roger, copy that.

Outstanding!

'Roger. It's all downhill from here.'

With each passing mission, the astronauts were learning how to enjoy life in space.

We are given the opportunity to carry some music onboard,

tapes to play in a pocket stereo player.

There's a song called the Southern Cross

by Crosby, Stills, Nash and Young.

I remember at one point looking out the window at the Southern Cross and playing that.

# When you see the Southern Cross for the first time

# You understand now why you came this way... #

You could spend days just looking out the window and taking it all in, learning what continents look like.

# But it's as big as the promise The promise of the coming day... #

I used to have little dreams when I was a kid that I'd run down the street and fly into the air.

That's what weightlessness is like.

We've bee having a lot of fun up here and, of course, doing a lot of good work for the space programme.

The first day or so, when you're adjusting to it,

you flail around a lot, reach for a switch and hit the ceiling.

Zero G in itself causes you to find games.

I would be up on a flight deck, working like a good pilot, and I'd hear the guys laughing and roaring.

When I finally went down, there they were doing this precision drill team stuff. It was fantastic.

'We were constantly asking the question, "Where's Joe?"

'And lo and behold, what should we find...

'but...but look at that.

'We have discovered either an alien space creature

'or... it is! It is Dr Allan!

'Largest personality, but diminutive in stature,

'he's managed to insert himself in yet another crevice.'

# Somebody fine will come along Make me forget about loving you

# At the Southern Cross. #

By August, 1984, NASA was so confident that the Shuttle was now a routine space bus

that it launched a new publicity campaign - a competition to put a teacher in space.

The BBC followed the story.

Around the country, teachers started filling in the 48-page application form.

Among them was a social science teacher from Concord, New Hampshire, called Christa McAuliffe.

Christa called us one evening when she was at home in Concord

and she said, "I'm applying for this teacher in space programme." And we thought it was great.

In the first place, we really didn't really think she'd probably get a chance.

But it was a fun process to even apply

and to get involved in any way.

And so then, of course, the nearer she got to it, the more excited we all became.

In all, 11,000 teachers applied, but by mid-July there were 10 left in the contest.

And the winner, the teacher who will be going into space,

Christa McAuliffe. Where is...? Is that you?

Christa was the first choice of all seven judges.

She was described as a great communicator and composed under pressure.

For NASA, it was a public relations coup.

Overnight, Christa became a national celebrity, the most famous astronaut since Neil Armstrong.

You kids out there, do the best you can and get the best education you can. That's what it's all about.

So when I'm up in that Shuttle, I want everyone working real hard

to make education what it should be in this country! Thank you!

Christa went to Florida to train with the Shuttle crew and immerse herself in the life of an astronaut.

On January 28th, 1986,

Christa and the crew prepared for launch.

Amongst the crowds waiting for lift-off were her parents.

'Velocity 2,257 feet per second, altitude 4.3 nautical miles, down range distance 3 nautical miles.'

All seemed normal until 73 seconds into the launch.

- 'Challenger, go with throttle up.' - Roger, throttle up.

'One minute 15 seconds, velocity 2,900 feet per second, altitude 9 nautical miles...

'Flight Controller is here looking very carefully at the situation.'

He said, "I don't see her. I don't see the Shuttle." I said, "It's gone." And it was.

You just knew that it was... No, you knew it was...

You knew.

'Obviously, a major malfunction.'

I guess it must have been a minute before I realised

that the crew was either dead or in the process of dying.

I wanted to cry.

And everybody around me. We couldn't look at each other.

I just sat in stunned silence for the longest period of time.

Basically, faced the wall, sat in my chair

and tried to hold back my emotions.

- Go ahead. - 'Vehicle exploded.'

Copy.

We're awaiting word from any recovery forces in the down range field.

As a team of experts began to look for the cause of the accident, a disturbing story unfolded.

A full year before the launch, a design fault had been discovered in the solid rocket boosters.

These are the powerful rockets strapped to the fuel tank

which provide extra thrust during lift-off.

The rockets are built for NASA by a company called Morton Thiokol,

based in Utah, over 2,000 miles away from Cape Canaveral.

This distance led to a crucial design problem.

Rather than have the rocket engines

built near the Cape, which would have been the best way, and barged in,

they were built in...

out in the prairies and then they had to be freighted all the way.

That meant being built in segments, which meant you had the joints.

With joints you may have problems.

Each joint was sealed using a rubber O ring

which expanded during launch to plug the joint and seal in super-heated gas.

Failure would mean that hot gas would burst out like a blowtorch.

So, for safety, the designers built in a secondary O ring.

Two minutes into every launch, the solid rockets detach, fall back to Earth

and are collected for re-use.

In January, 1985, one of Morton Thiokol's engineers made a routine examination of a booster

that had been retrieved from the previous Shuttle launch.

What he found shocked him.

When those boosters were separated

and I inspected all six joints, two joints had been badly compromised.

On that January flight, the primary O rings in the compromised joints had failed.

Only the presence of the secondary O rings had prevented a catastrophic explosion.

When I saw that in real time in January of 1985,

I almost had cardiac arrest. I could not believe that we hadn't blown it up at that point in time.

The January launch had been the coldest ever.

Boisjoly concluded that the O rings had failed because the cold temperatures had made them brittle.

He reported back to his managers and NASA was informed.

NASA ordered a full review of the joints, but decided the O ring system was safe enough

to keep the Shuttle flying.

A year later, as Challenger waited on the launch pad,

conditions were even colder than they had been the previous January.

NASA consulted with engineers at Morton Thiokol

who were reluctant to give the go ahead for launch

in such cold temperatures.

But NASA was impatient. Its recent launches had been dogged by last-minute delays.

This launch was already four days behind schedule.

In a last-minute tele-conference, under pressure from NASA,

Morton Thiokol withdrew its opposition to the launch.

But it WAS too cold

and in one of the joints both O rings failed.

The vehicle broke up into hundreds of fragments.

The crew compartment plummeted towards the ocean,

but at seven miles up, it took nearly 2.5 minutes to descend.

Later, NASA calculated that some of the crew might have been conscious on descent

and that all were probably alive.

The seven astronauts perished when the stricken craft hit the sea at more than 200 miles an hour.

The destruction of Challenger and its brave crew greatly affected America.

The media appetite for Christa McAuliffe meant the nation knew this Shuttle crew like no other.

Commander Dick Scobee.

Pilot Mike Smith.

Dr Judith Resnik.

Dr Ron McNair.

Lieutenant Colonel Ellison Onizuka.

Captain Greg Jarvis.

And teacher Christa McAuliffe.

The tragedy grounded the Shuttle

and paralysed NASA's manned space programme.

But Americans could not give up the dream of exploring space.

NASA set about a major redesign.

Clearly, the solid rockets would have to be re-engineered,

but NASA also seized the chance to make a host of other safety improvements.

The astronauts appointed to fly the next mission followed every part of the redesign closely.

Morton Thiokol, Utah.

The first in a series of tests

of the redesigned solid rocket.

The critical path begins.

The crew is here.

Their success and, ultimately, their lives depend on the work of many.

We're obviously interested in witnessing the test firing. It's step one, as was said earlier,

-in getting us back into manned spaceflight.

-In the solids, two rubbery O ring seals

were supposed to stop a leak of hot gas. Now they're experimenting with a third O ring.

This was its first test.

Six, five, four,

three, two, one.

Fire!

The ascent phase of this mission will be like a test flight. We have new solid rocket motors,

the motors themselves have been greatly re-engineered,

including parts of the booster.

And all those things together, this will be the first flight test.

Landing and stopping can be just as chancy as lift-off in this business.

June last year. They roll the Shuttle slowly into a safety net.

And also last summer, they finally had time to improve the spacecraft's unreliable brakes and tyres.

'There are always going to be problems and glitches. That's what you expect.

'Certainly all of us as crew are aware that this is a risky business

'and the crew of the Challenger was no different. All we can do now is regroup and rebuild

'and press on. We have to live with what happened and keep going.'

We designed the Space Shuttle in the '70s without an escape system.

And I think

everyone realises that was a mistake.

I don't think we'll ever see a rocket built again without an escape system.

Hurricane Mesa, Utah.

They're using a dummy to test a new escape system.

The tractor rocket concept is an adaptation of the ejector seats used in military jet aircraft,

only here the astronauts will be pulled, not pushed to safety.

The engineers say it is a tested system with a 90% success rate.

Pinky has come to watch.

The most thing that goes through my mind is I hope I never do it.

The orbiter has to be flying so the vehicle has to be intact and flying through the atmosphere.

We couldn't bail out when the engines were running or if we lost control

or if the vehicle was badly damaged. This system would not work for that.

The system provides a narrow margin of safety at best.

Escape is only possible under limited circumstances.

Privately, some astronauts tell you the whole thing is a sop to public anxiety.

'Three, two, one.'

Whatever NASA's motives, an escape system was eventually included,

along with a further 345 modifications.

Only then was the Shuttle considered safe enough to go back into space.

CHEERING AND APPLAUSE

For over two years now...

..each one of us here tonight has had a dream

that one day

a Shuttle would once again make its way to the launch pad to launch Americans into space.

'Start. Three, two, one, zero.

'And lift off! Lift off.

'Americans return to space as Discovery clears the tower.'

The Challenger disaster had shown conclusively that space flight was not a routine activity

and the refit had cost over 20 billion

so the Shuttle would never again be described as cheap.

It needed to do something spectacular to prove that it was no white elephant.

Soon it got its chance.

In 1984, Horizon reported on plans to build the world's most ambitious telescope.

The Hubble Space Telescope will see much further into the universe

than has ever been possible before.

Freed from the obscuring effects of the atmosphere,

the optical system at the heart of the spacecraft will enable the telescope's mirror

to resolve details ten times better than any instrument on the ground.

When it's installed in the space telescope,

this mirror is set to revolutionise our vision of the universe.

It will allow us to search the stars for other solar systems that may harbour life

and closer to home, we will be able to study the planets

with a resolution equivalent to the Voyager probe only a few days away from its closest encounter.

In purely numerical terms,

it's as big or a bigger leap

than occurred when Galileo first used a telescope,

rather than the naked eye, to look at the universe and look at stars.

We know for sure that every area of astronomy will be very profoundly affected.

The space telescope will benefit from the presence of man in space,

both to maintain its instruments and to carry out repairs if it breaks down.

No-one had any idea how soon a breakdown would happen.

In 1990, the Hubble Space Telescope was deployed into orbit.

But when the telescope was used for the first time,

the Hubble astronomers received a profound shock.

Instead of the pin-sharp pictures they were expecting...

..they got these smudges,

barely better than ground-based telescopes could produce.

The problem was the enormous mirror now seated at the heart of the telescope.

It couldn't focus light perfectly because it had been polished a fraction out of shape.

Decades of work, billions of dollars and the hopes of a generation of astronomers

had been destroyed.

Once again, NASA was under attack.

Have we ended up with degraded science or cancelled science?

If this aberration was such a textbook case,

why wasn't it caught on the ground?

What are the possible things that could have happened?

How many straws are there on this camel's back?

It would be dishonest to say the mood of the scientist is very happy right now.

We're all frustrated, obviously. And I'll stop there.

'The press conference where we announced Hubble's spherical aberration

'was by far the worst day of my life. I was saying we messed it up.'

So at that point, I was convinced the programme was dead.

People began to disintegrate.

Some had to be taken out by guards

to rehabilitation centres for drugs and alcohol.

The astronomy community was tearing itself apart.

I personally felt like killing somebody

because having invested 12 years of my life up to that point

in this project, and seeing that this was a really major disaster for us...

..you know, the reaction is that one.

Everybody began blaming everybody about how could this have happened, how could such a mistake be made.

It was a very bad time.

The Hubble had to be saved at all costs.

Scientists and engineers began desperately trying to find a solution to its problem.

..which we've listed as mechanical correction or deformation.

'We formed a committee, a strategy panel to come up with ideas and about 30 suggestions came up.'

Number 85...

'We put everything on the table,'

even the craziest idea, to see what we could do to fix the problem.

This is replacement of the secondary, just as a straight correction.

They ranged from the shuttle bringing the spacecraft back to Earth

and replacing the primary mirror...

..to send astronauts up and actually, inside the tube of the telescope,

and do something to the optics, which was crazy, but we discussed it.

A full aperture correction...

There were ideas even to try to re-coat or change the shape of the primary on orbit with heaters.

To put a mirror in front of the telescope which was slightly bent, so you'd have the correction in it.

Trying to move the instruments back by several metres.

-Front end of the telescope...

-A report...

-I don't have a picture.

And so on and so forth.

Among the proposals was the ingenious solution,

an instrument that would match the error in the mirror in reverse and cancel it out.

This optical fix was called the Corrective Optics Space Telescope Axial Replacement,

or COSTAR for short.

There was no way of knowing whether COSTAR would actually work.

But hopes of saving the Hubble now lay with this intricate design.

Plans for an ambitious repair mission began to take shape.

Everybody knew what happened when we failed with Hubble the first time

and everybody knew the stakes were very high. A second failure would be unforgivable.

I mean, there were words that were even...

Such as, "This is the measure of NASA.

"This mission is the measure. This mission defines... Is there a NASA?"

There was enough pressure to just do this mission,

but now suddenly, instead of the future of Hubble,

the future of your entire space programme is depending on success.

NASA was relying on the Shuttle and its crew.

Along with COSTAR, they would also have to put in a new camera and make a host of other repairs.

It would mean a record 35 hours of space walks over five days.

By December 1993, they were ready to go.

'Houston, we are inspired, we are ready. Let's go fix this thing.'

The astronauts got to work.

They knew the tiniest mistake could be catastrophic for the mission.

'Four, five, six.

'You're clear in. You got it.'

'Look at that baby!

'Beautiful, spanking-new WF/PC.'

First came the delicate task of putting in the new camera.

Later, COSTAR was manoeuvred into position with less than an inch of clearance on either side.

'Would you like to see it?

'Good work, guys.

'Whoo!'

The astronauts had completed every task to perfection.

Now it was over to the scientists on the ground.

Then it dawned on us - wait a minute, this is only half the job.

Will that camera work? Will COSTAR work?

Did we get the right prescription for those glasses to put on Hubble?

Two weeks later, it was time to put the repairs to the test.

First, they tried out the new camera.

'As usual, everything on Hubble happens at night for some reason

'and the first images were scheduled to come down at 1am.

'The whole camera team were around the computer screen.

'The image slowly built, so you see the bright things first and right in the centre was a very bright star.'

CHEERING

-One bright...

-Right there.

CHEERING We did it.

Wait, wait, wait.

-Bring it up.

-Come on, come on, come on.

Those are actually stars. Those are real stars.

LAUGHTER

CORK POPS

CHEERING AND APPLAUSE

'Everyone was thrilled. There were cheers.'

It was black and white.

Before, we didn't know, and afterwards, we knew. We had it.

Astronomers saw in spectacular detail for the first time where stars are born...

..how they die...

..and back in time to the origins of the universe.

Without the Shuttle, it wouldn't have been possible to get these images from Hubble.

This incredible success was a major milestone for NASA.

Hubble was saved and the Shuttle was back in the nation's good books.

But the rescue mission would also pave the way for a project of even more extraordinary ambition.

Ideas for a futuristic space station had been around for decades.

Many of them inhabited the murky world between science fact and fiction.

But NASA had firm plans to create one for real.

In 1984, President Reagan revealed to the world and to Mrs Thatcher

models of a permanent, orbital space station.

One of its great...

But the plans stalled as NASA scientists found it impossible

to decide what that space station should be like.

The Russians meanwhile had no such problems.

They had had Salyut 1 in orbit since 1971.

And they had followed this success by building the even more complex Mir space station.

Meanwhile, by 1993,

the US had spent an alarming eight billion dollars

on countless re-designs without building a single piece of hardware.

Congress was threatening to pull the plug.

But something had happened that would give the US space station a reprieve.

The old enemy, the Soviet Union, had collapsed.

Russia's once spectacular space programme was almost bankrupt.

In the new era of peace between nations,

NASA's chief administrator had an idea.

Dan Goldin invited the Russians to collaborate.

This is a historic moment. I'm just very excited. Mr Koptev, I want to give you a hug.

APPLAUSE

It was a hug that would get Shuttle astronauts on to Mir.

I'm Jerry Linenger, of course, and I'm in the base block

where you see most pictures that come out of Mir.

This is where we gather to eat...

Jerry Linenger was the fourth American astronaut to join the Russians on Mir.

This is the commander's station. Vasily says hello to everybody...

'I had a sense that I was doing something good for the country.

'I was about 14 when I saw the moon landings and I said, "I'd like to do that some day."'

You get lucky sometimes.

Mir has been lived in almost continuously since she was launched in 1986.

SPEAKS IN RUSSIAN

But life on Mir was far from perfect.

The ageing space station was falling apart.

Oxygen generators repeatedly broke down.

There were daily chemical leaks. Even the toilet malfunctioned.

We had many system failures and they were in need of your constant attention.

And many days I'd start an experiment in the morning to get it running,

then I'd run over to help hacksaw through a pipe and plug the ends, then run back to my experiment.

Most dangerous of all, in the sixth week of Linenger's stay,

a fire broke out.

I looked down the passageway and I could see a very large flame...

..bursting out of the canister,

smoke billowing out, and I knew we had a big problem.

The fire was blocking the exit to one of the two escape ships.

If the crew couldn't put it out, some of them would be left behind to die.

Cosmonaut Valery Korzun finally put out the fire, but smoke continued to fill Mir.

Linenger was relieved when his 19-week stay in orbit was over.

Watching the Shuttle coming up underneath us at 18,000 miles an hour

was the most beautiful sight in the world.

I was ready to go home

and for me, it was a moment of triumph.

The Shuttle's there. I'd made it.

And when the Shuttle came and docked, it was glorious.

Despite its faults, the Russian collaboration was a turning point in NASA's plans for a space station.

They now had valuable data on how humans reacted to long stays in space.

And it had secured co-operation for an International Space Station.

'T minus 60 seconds and counting.

'Everything looking good for launch of Space Shuttle Endeavour from Kennedy Space Center.

'T minus 50 seconds.'

Now that the Shuttle had smoothed the path for the new space station, it was sent to build it.

'Ten, nine, eight,

'seven, six, five,

'four, three,

'two, one, zero

'and lift-off of Endeavour,

'going where East and West do meet at the International Space Station.'

CHEERING

'Endeavour, Houston. Congratulations to all the members of the crew. It's a beautiful sight.'

The space station began a new era in the colonisation of space.

Nations which were sworn enemies only years before worked together

to build a truly international machine.

In the first five years of construction, the Shuttle made 16 trips to the space station,

but it was slow work.

By 2002, NASA was under pressure to do more with the Shuttle

than just use it as a ferry to the ISS.

Its answer was to launch a scientific study mission,

though the lessons learned would have more grim implications.

Columbia, the oldest craft in the fleet,

was fitted with a state-of-the-art space laboratory.

This mission would be the first to use it.

It meant that for NASA and the seven astronauts on board, there was a lot at stake.

And for 16 days, everything went according to plan.

The team worked round the clock on their experiments.

If we didn't work 24 hours a day, we'd be giving up eight hours of sleep time

that could be used for science.

So the intent is to pack each minute of the 24 hours

that we're on orbit with science.

After two weeks in space, the science mission was declared a triumph.

All that was left was to gather their results,

re-enter the Earth's atmosphere and come home.

The entries are a bit better than the launch. It's a bit quieter.

It's not quite as violent and you can enjoy it a little bit.

At the end of 16 days, we'll come back and land,

slowing from 17,000-plus miles per hour down to 200-plus miles per hour.

We're hoping our commander will make a smooth landing and the mission will be over.

ALL: Bye-bye!

On the 1st of February, 2003,

Columbia began its descent back to Earth.

As the Shuttle raced over the Pacific towards the US,

the crew put on their suits, preparing themselves for a routine landing.

'Columbia's a beautiful ship, performing magnificently.'

At 8.44am, Columbia re-entered the Earth's atmosphere.

Still everything appeared normal.

'There might be some plasma now.'

-GNC, Flight?

-Flight, GNC.

Everything look good to you? Control and rates and everything is nominal?

-Control's been stable. We have good trims. I don't see anything out of the ordinary.

-OK.

'It's noisy in there.'

Then, just 22 minutes before touchdown at 8.54 in the morning,

there was an unusual reading from one of the Shuttle's many sensors.

-Flight, MMACS.

-Go ahead, MMACS.

I've just lost four separate temperature transducers on the left side of the vehicle,

hydraulic return temperatures.

Columbia, Houston, comm check.

Columbia, Houston, UHF comm check.

TOTAL SILENCE

Columbia, Houston, UHF comm check.

Columbia, Houston, UHF comm check.

At 9.16, the truth dawned on Mission Control.

The Space Shuttle had been lost.

61 kilometres above the ground,

the Shuttle had disintegrated, killing all seven people on board.

Once again, NASA found itself asking the terrible question,

"What had gone wrong with the Shuttle?"

Within minutes of the disaster,

NASA's investigators had swung into action.

They began to concentrate on an event that had happened

at the very beginning of Columbia's voyage.

It was something to do

with the Shuttle's large, orange fuel tank.

During this particular launch,

it appears that a large chunk of this spray-on foam broke off

at the place where the Shuttle attaches to the tank up by under the nose.

This video shows a piece of orange insulating foam falling off the fuel tank

81 seconds into the flight.

The chunk appears to be about the size of a briefcase, maybe a little bit bigger,

and weighs somewhere around two and a half to three pounds.

The foam had struck and damaged the wing's leading edge,

an area covered by ultra-strong, grey, carbon-carbon panels designed to be indestructible.

The leading edge, the reinforced carbon-carbon, is hard, like a rock.

And for foam to have damaged the RCC enough

to cause an accident still surprises me.

But tests showed that a foam block could indeed puncture the tiles,

inevitably leading to a catastrophic failure of the heat shield.

Some felt that NASA could have saved Columbia and its crew.

That they could have been brought back to Earth alive.

NASA knew a chunk of foam had hit the orbiter during launch.

It could have used a telescope on Earth to examine the Shuttle in orbit

to see if any tiles had been damaged.

Or it could have asked the astronauts to open a hatch and take a look.

Once it had discovered the damage,

NASA could have asked the crew to bring the Shuttle in at a different angle, favouring the undamaged wing.

You might have led sort of sideways,

crabbing the Shuttle in, scorching the good side,

protecting the damaged side.

But even if this wasn't possible,

NASA still had another much more ambitious option -

a rescue mission.

At the time of the disaster, the Shuttle Atlantis was being prepared for launch.

NASA could have sent it up to rescue the crew within weeks.

A rescue mission like this would have been a major achievement for NASA

and a public relations coup,

proof that they had the expertise and skills to do remarkable things.

The tragedy is none of these options was even considered.

Columbia was a powerful reminder that manned space flight is inherently dangerous.

But America was adamant that the names of the dead should be honoured

and that the programme must continue.

Another re-design began.

The foam insulation on the fuel tank was improved

and systems were put in place to check for tile damage in orbit.

Two years later, a new crew prepared to return to space

on the 114th flight in the Shuttle fleet's career.

But even as the Shuttle orbited, NASA had already decided it was time to call it a day.

Its flawed, compromised design means there are just too many things that can go wrong.

Since 2003, there has been a collective crossing of fingers every time a Shuttle has launched

and every time one has returned safely.

With the end of the programme, that anxiety is over.

But what a ride the Shuttle has given us!

The programme has launched more people into space than all previous American space missions combined

and allowed humans to continue to reach out beyond our planet.

The Hubble Space Telescope has given us a view on the dawn of time and the birth of stars.

The construction of the International Space Station has shown what can be achieved

when once hostile nations collaborate.

And Earth observations have given us valuable insights into the changing face of our home.

But perhaps more than anything, the Shuttle has shown us what we are capable of.

It has provided us with a stepping stone to the missions of the future.

Where that future takes us will be up to the next generation

of engineers, politicians and scientists

who take on the great endeavour of space exploration.

Subtitles by Subtext for Red Bee Media Ltd 2011

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