Fly Me To The Moon (You're Less Likely To Kill Me)

A report just out concludes the the Columbia shuttle disaster in Feb 2003 was not survivable. The sad fact is astronauts were safer flying to the moon atop the gigantic Saturn 5 rockets than they were in the comparatively simpler missions to Earth orbit.

The first major failure occurred in January of 1986 O-rings designed to keep the hot gasses inside the right-hand solid rocket booster (SRB) failed due to extreme cold. The resulting breakup caused the loss of Challenger and all seven crew before the vehicle even left Earth's atmosphere. Physicist Richard Feynman revealed the primary cause of failure at a press conference by keeping a sample of the O-ring material in a glass of iced water to the surprise and embarrassment of NASA management.

Unlike Challenger, Columbia actually carried out her mission but her fate was sealed before the orbiter had even cleared the tower. A piece of insulating foam broke away and pierced the heat resisting tiles under the left wing. Although NASA were aware of the incident, it seems that no one bothered to tell the crew.

According to the BBC, the 400 page "Columbia Crew Survival Investigation Report" concludes the accident was not survivable. They had around 41 seconds after realising the craft was in trouble before the vehicle finally broke up and tried desperately to rectify the problem. Some of the crew were not wearing the bulk helmets and gloves that might have kept them alive longer; others were not even strapped into their seats.

NASA Deputy Associate Administrator, Wayne Hale, concludes soberly that lessons had to be learnt, urging spacecraft designers everywhere to study the, "hard lessons which have been paid for so dearly."

The agency had not lost a single astronaut in any of the manned moon missions (although the crew of Apollo 13 came perilously close) and several others lost their lives in during training.

Has space travel become too routine? In both cases there's a body of evidence pointing at cost cutting in key areas and, frankly, poor management. Either way we should never forget the courage demonstrated by those who offered and finally gave their lives for the betterment of humanity.