Order Code RS21408
Updated June 9, 2003
CRS Report for Congress
Received through the CRS Web
NASA’s Space Shuttle Columbia: Quick Facts
and Issues for Congress
Marcia S. Smith
Specialist in Aerospace and Telecommunications Policy
Resources, Science, and Industry Division
Summary
On February 1, 2003, NASA’s Space Shuttle Columbia broke apart while returning
to Earth from a 16-day science mission in orbit. All seven astronauts — six Americans
and one Israeli — were killed. An investigation is underway. This report provides
quick facts about Columbia, her crew, the STS-107 mission, the status of the
investigation, and a brief discussion of issues for Congress. Additional information on
the space shuttle program is available in CRS Issue Brief IB93062, CRS Report
RS21411, and CRS Report RS21419. This report will be updated regularly.
The Loss of the Space Shuttle Columbia
The space shuttle Columbia was launched on its STS-107 mission on January 16,
2003. After completing a 16-day scientific research mission, Columbia started its descent
to Earth on the morning of February 1, 2003. As it descended from orbit, approximately
16 minutes before its scheduled landing at Kennedy Space Center, FL, Columbia broke
apart over northeastern Texas. All seven astronauts aboard were killed. They were
Commander Rick Husband; Pilot William McCool; Mission Specialists Michael P.
Anderson, David M. Brown, Kalpana Chawla, and Laurel Clark; and payload specialist
Ilan Ramon, an Israeli. The last communication with Columbia was at about 09:00 EST.
The shuttle was at an altitude of 207,135 feet, traveling at a speed of Mach 18.3 (about
13,000 miles per hour).
Accident Investigation
NASA Administrator Sean O’Keefe immediately appointed an internal “Mishap
Investigation Board,” (MIB) and also an external group, the “Columbia Accident
Investigation Board” (CAIB), to investigate the accident. MIB was replaced by the
NASA Accident Investigation Team (NAIT) on March 21, 2003.
Much of the
i n f o r m a t i o n
N A S A
i s
r e l e a s i n g
c a n
b e
o b t a i n e d
a t
[http://www.nasa.gov/columbia/home/index.html].
Congressional Research Service ˜ The Library of Congress

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The CAIB is chaired by Adm. (Ret.) Harold Gehman, former NATO Supreme
Allied Commander, Atlantic, and has its own Web site [http://www.caib.us].
NASA
transitioned responsibility for the investigation to the CAIB on February 6. There is no
time limit on the Board’s investigation. NASA revised the Board’s charter three times to
clarify its independence from NASA, primarily in response to congressional concerns.
However, the CAIB was created by NASA, includes NASA representatives, and new
Board members must be appointed by the NASA Administrator, so concerns about its
independence continue. Another criticism is that the members of the Board who were not
government employees at the time they were chosen were then hired as Special
Government Employees.
Since that means that all the Board members now are
government employees, the Board is not subject to the Federal Advisory Committee Act
(FACA), thereby restricting public access to meetings and records. Furthermore, the
Board members are being paid with NASA funds, which critics contend may influence
their judgment. Adm. Gehman insists that NASA is merely a conduit for the funds, which
were appropriated by Congress specifically for the Columbia investigation and which he
oversees as Board chairman. Another controversy is that the Board has conducted
interviews with NASA and contractor employees on a confidential basis, and the Board
did not want the results of those interviews disclosed to Congress or the public. Adm.
Gehman since has indicated that an agreement is being developed whereby certain
Members of Congress will have access to that documentation.
On
May
6,
the
CAIB
released
a
“Working
Scenario”,
available
at
[http://www.caib.us], that represents the Board’s and NASA’s current understanding of
events leading to Columbia’s breakup. It is based on sensor readings, still and video
photography, testing, and forensic analysis of recovered debris. The working scenario is
that the shuttle began its reentry into Earth’s atmosphere with “unknown damage” to a
reinforced carbon-carbon (RCC) panel along the front (leading edge) of the left wing, or
to a “T-seal” connecting two RCC panels. A breach occurred in the wing soon after
“entry interface” (when the shuttle first encounters the atmosphere), and as the shuttle
continued its descent, the increasingly superheated air surrounding the shuttle entered the
wing through the breach, burning through the wing’s structure. As the wing failed, its
shape deformed, causing exterior materials (such as tiles) to detach and changing the
aerodynamics of the shuttle. The orbiter’s maneuvering engines fired to compensate for
increased drag on the left side, but could not control the orbiter as damage progressed.
The vehicle ultimately broke apart due to aerodynamic forces. Adm. Gehman stressed
that this scenario is being used only to focus the investigation and may change at any time
based on additional analysis.
Precisely how the breach occurred remains uncertain, though many believe that the
left wing was damaged by an object that fell off the shuttle’s External Tank1 and struck
the orbiter 82 seconds after launch. The day after the launch, NASA experts reviewing
footage of the launch discerned something hitting the orbiter. During Columbia’s mission,
1 The Space Transportation System (STS) — the space shuttle — consists of an airplane-like
orbiter, two Solid Rocket Boosters (SRBs) on either side of the orbiter, and a large cylindrical
External Tank that holds the fuel for the orbiter’s main engines. The SRBs detach from the
orbiter about 2 ½ minutes after launch when their fuel is spent, fall into the ocean, and are
recovered for refurbishment and reuse. The External Tank is not reused. It is jettisoned as the
orbiter reaches Earth orbit, and disintegrates as it falls into the Indian Ocean.

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Boeing analyzed what damage might have been caused by the object, thought to be
insulating foam, to protective tiles that form part of the shuttle’s thermal protection.
Boeing concluded that the impact of the debris created no safety of flight issue. The
analysis apparently did not assess potential damage to the RCC panels. Other theories
are that ice or a heavier insulating material hit the orbiter during launch. Although the
Board knows that debris impacted the orbiter during ascent, it has not concluded that the
damage to the left wing was caused by that event. Other possibilities include that the
shuttle was struck by space debris, or the RCC panels failed due to aging. On June 6, the
CAIB reported the results of a test where foam was shot at an RCC panel taken from the
orbiter Discovery (which has flown 30 times in space). The foam strike created “visible
and significant damage” on the RCC panel and an adjacent T-seal. The Board continues
to stress that it has not reached a conclusion about what caused the Columbia accident,
however.
Some shuttle engineers requested that NASA ask the Department of Defense to
image the shuttle while it was in orbit with ground-based telescopes or satellites to gather
more data about the extent of damage. NASA officials declined to do so reportedly
because the Boeing analysis indicated there was no safety of flight issue, and such images
taken on earlier flights were unhelpful. NASA now has an agreement with the National
Imagery and Mapping Agency (NIMA) that NIMA will image the shuttle on a routine
“targets of opportunity” basis, and, in an emergency, upon specific request from NASA.
NASA and the Board are assessing what could have been done if a determination had
been made that the tiles or RCC panels were damaged. Originally, NASA officials stated
that nothing could have been done since the astronauts could not have repaired them in
orbit. NASA Administrator O’Keefe emphasizes that if they had known of any safety of
flight issue, NASA would have done everything possible to save Columbia.
Because of the threat of terrorism, and the presence of an Israeli astronaut on the
mission, questions arose as to whether the loss of Columbia could be attributed to
terrorism. Government officials stress that there is no evidence that the tragedy could
have been caused by terrorists.
CAIB Recommendations
On April 17, 2003, the CAIB issued two preliminary recommendations. The Board
found that current inspection techniques are not adequate to assess the structural integrity
of the RCC panels, supporting structure, and attaching hardware.
Therefore, it
recommended that NASA develop and implement a comprehensive inspection plan prior
to the shuttle’s return to flight. Second, the Board found that the full capabilities of the
United States to image Columbia during its flight were not utilized. It recommended that
NASA modify the arrangement it recently reached with NIMA (discussed above) to make
on-orbit imaging of each shuttle flight a standard requirement.
Space Shuttle Columbia
Columbia was one of four flightworthy reusable space shuttle orbiters in NASA’s
fleet. The others are Discovery, Atlantis, and Endeavour. A fifth orbiter, Challenger, was
lost in a 1986 accident. Another orbiter, Enterprise, was used for approach and landing

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tests in the 1970s and was not designed to travel in space. Enterprise now belongs to the
Smithsonian’s National Air and Space Museum.
Columbia was the first spaceflight-worthy orbiter built for NASA by Rockwell
International (the space division of Rockwell, which built the orbiters, was later bought
by Boeing ). It was used for the very first shuttle flight on April 12, 1981. The STS-107
mission that ended tragically on February 1, 2003 was Columbia’s 28th flight. Although
Columbia is the oldest orbiter, Discovery has been used for more flights (30). Orbiters
are periodically taken out of service for maintenance and overhaul. Columbia underwent
an inspection and retrofit program from August 1991-February 1992, was in an “orbiter
maintenance down period” in 1994-1995, and an “orbiter major modification” (OMM)
period in 1999-2001. STS-107 was its second flight after the OMM.
Columbia’s STS-107 Crew
Commander: Air Force Colonel Rick D. Husband, b. July 12, 1957, Amarillo, TX.
Married, two children. This was his second flight into space, having piloted STS-96 in
1999. Received a BS in mechanical engineering from Texas Tech University in 1980 and
a MS in mechanical engineering from California State University-Fresno in 1990.
Pilot: Navy Commander William “Willie” McCool, b. September 23, 1961, San
Diego, CA. Married, three children. This was his first spaceflight. Received a BS in
applied science from the U.S. Naval Academy in 1983, an MS in Computer Science from
the University of Maryland in 1985, and an MS in aeronautical engineering from the U.S.
Naval Postgraduate School in 1992.
Payload Commander/Mission Specialist 3: Air Force Lieutenant Colonel Michael
P. Anderson, b. December 25, 1959, Plattsburgh, NY. Married. two children. This was
his second spaceflight, having flown on STS-89. Received a BS in physics/astronomy
from the University of Washington in 1981 and an MS in physics from Creighton
University in 1990.
Mission Specialist 1: Navy Captain David M. Brown, b. April 16, 1956, Arlington,
VA. Single. This was his first spaceflight. Received a BS in biology from the College
of William and Mary in 1978 and a doctorate in medicine from Eastern Virginia Medical
School in 1982.
Mission Specialist 2: Dr. Kalpana Chawla, b. July 1, 1961, Karnal, India. Married. Dr.
Chawla is a naturalized U.S. citizen, and was making her second spaceflight. Received
a BS in aeronautical engineering from Punjab Engineering College, India, in 1982; an MS
in aerospace engineering from the University of Texas in 1984; and a PhD in aerospace
engineering from the University of Colorado in 1988.
Mission Specialist 4: Navy Commander (captain-select) Laurel Blair Salton Clark,
b. March 10, 1961, Ames, Iowa, but considered Racine, WI as her hometown. Married,
one child. STS-107 was her first spaceflight. Received a BS in zoology from the
University of Wisconsin-Madison in 1983 and a doctorate in medicine from the same
school in 1987.

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Payload Specialist: Colonel, Israeli Air Force, Ilan Ramon, b. June 20, 1954, Tel
Aviv, Israel. Married, four children. STS-107 was his first spaceflight. Received BS in
electronic and computer engineering from the University of Tel Aviv, Israel, in 1987.
The STS-107 Mission
STS-107 was a scientific research mission that, unlike most current shuttle launches,
was not related to the International Space Station (ISS) program. The launch of STS-107
had been delayed for a variety of reasons since the summer of 2001. According to
NASA’s STS-107 press kit [http://spaceflight.nasa.gov] and news accounts, STS-107
carried a SPACEHAB Double Module in the shuttle’s cargo bay, which allows astronauts
to conduct scientific experiments in a “shirt-sleeve” environment. The crew, working
round-the-clock, conducted a research program involving 32 payloads, with 59 separate
investigations. SPACEHAB marketed 18% of the module’s capacity to international and
industry commercial users, while NASA experiments made up the remaining 82%.
Students from six schools in Australia, China, Israel, Japan, Liechtenstein, and the United
States probed the effects of spaceflight on spiders, silkworms, inorganic crystals, fish,
bees, and ants, respectively. Other experiments were attached to the outside of the
SPACEHAB Double Module, or on a bridge-like structure mounted across Columbia’s
payload bay. The latter, called Fast Reaction Experiments Enabling Science, Technology,
Applications and Research (FREESTAR), included the Mediterranean Israeli Dust
Experiment which involved observations of Israel from space. Some of the research
required analysis of specimens and data sets after the shuttle returned to Earth, and they
were destroyed along with the crew and orbiter. Other data, however, were transmitted
to ground-based researchers during the flight, and a few specimens were retrieved among
the debris, so some of the research survived. Quantifying the amount is difficult
Previous Crew Fatalities During Space Missions
The United States has suffered two other spaceflight-related accidents that caused
astronaut fatalities. On January 27, 1967, the three-man crew of the first Apollo mission
died when a fire erupted in their Apollo command module during a pre-launch test. The
three astronauts were Virgil “Gus” Grissom, Edward White, and Roger Chaffee. A
NASA investigation determined that electrical arcing in spacecraft wiring caused the fire.
Modifications were made to the Apollo design and test procedures before Apollo flights
resumed 21 months later.
On January 28, 1986, the space shuttle Challenger (STS 51-L) exploded 73 seconds
after launch, killing all seven astronauts aboard: Francis “Dick” Scobee, Michael Smith,
Judith Resnik, Ellison Onizuka, Ronald McNair, Gregory Jarvis (a payload specialist from
Hughes Aircraft), and schoolteacher Christa McAuliffe. President Reagan appointed a
special commission to investigate the accident, chaired by former Secretary of State
William Rogers. The Rogers Commission determined that cold weather at the launch site
caused a rubber “O-ring” in one of the Solid Rocket Boosters (SRBs) to fail, allowing
gases to escape, resulting in a catastrophic explosion. The shuttle system was grounded
for 32 months while NASA redesigned the SRBs. The shuttle returned to flight in
September 1988.
Congress appropriated $2.1 billion to build a replacement for
Challenger. The new orbiter, Endeavour, made its first flight in May 1992.

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Four Soviet cosmonauts also died during spaceflights.
Cosmonaut Vladimir
Komarov died during the first Soyuz flight on April 24, 1969. The spacecraft’s parachute
tangled during descent and it struck the ground with great force, killing Colonel Komarov.
Soviet human spaceflights were suspended for 18 months while the Soviets investigated
and remedied the problem. Three cosmonauts died on Soyuz 11 on June 29, 1971 when
an improperly sealed valve allowed the spacecraft’s atmosphere to vent into space. The
cosmonauts — Georgiy Dobrovolskiy, Vladislav Volkov, and Viktor Patsayev — were
not wearing spacesuits, and were asphyxiated. There were no Soviet human spaceflights
for 27 months while modifications were made to the spacecraft.
Issues for Congress
Following is a brief list of questions framing the debate over Columbia and the
future of the human space flight program. A key factor in evaluating many of these
questions is how long the shuttle system may be grounded, but that is not yet known.
•
Was funding for the shuttle program adequate to ensure shuttle safety?
•
Did NASA adequately respond to concerns expressed over the past several years by the
Aerospace Safety Advisory Panel and others (see CRS Report RS21419) that the shuttle
program was under stress due to funding and workforce constraints?
•
Did NASA adequately investigate damage that might have been caused to Columbia’s
thermal protection system (tiles and RCC panels)by objects that fell from the External Tank
during launch? If Columbia had been damaged, was there anything NASA could have done
to ensure the safe return of Columbia’s crew?
•
Is the Columbia Accident Investigation Board the best group to assist NASA in this
investigation, or should the White House have established a “blue-ribbon” commission
independent of NASA as was done following the Challenger tragedy in 1986?
•
What are the funding implications of the Columbia accident for the space shuttle program,
and for the space station program, which relies on the shuttle for assembly and operation?
•
Should permanent occupancy of the space station be suspended until the shuttle system is
operating again, or should the space station partners (the United States, Russia, Europe,
Japan, and Canada) indefinitely rely on Russian Soyuz and Progress spacecraft to bring
crews and cargo to space station? (See CRS Issue Brief 93017.)
•
If the decision is made to rely indefinitely on Russian spacecraft beyond those that Russian
already has agreed to provide at no cost to the other partners, who will pay for them? The
Iran Nonproliferation Act (P.L. 106-178) prohibits NASA from making payments to Russia,
in cash or in kind, in connection with the space station program unless the President
certifies that Russia is not proliferating nuclear or missile technologies to Iran.
•
Should a replacement orbiter be built? If so, how much will it cost and how long will it
take? If not, can NASA service the Hubble Space Telescope and continue assembly and
operation of the space station with only three orbiters?
•
Should efforts to develop an Orbital Space Plane be accelerated instead of building a
replacement for Columbia? To what extent can those plans be accelerated?
•
Are the benefits of human spaceflight worth the risks and costs?
Three congressional hearings have been held to date: February 12 (joint hearing
Senate Commerce Committee/ House Science Committee); February 27 ( House Science
Committee); and May 14 (Senate Commerce Committee).

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