"There is no better place to emphasize
the unity of people in the world than flying in space. We are all the same
people, we are all human beings, and I believe that most of us, almost
all of us, are good people"
Ilan Ramon
Israel's First Astronaut
On Januray 16, 2003, the space shuttle Columbia
was launched and was to spend 16 days in space on a science mission. On
February 1, 2003, the space shuttle Columbia exploded during what appeared
to be re-entry into the Earth's atmosphere. NASA speculates that
damage to thermal tiles during liftoff may be the cause of this explosion.
Aboard Columbia were five men and two women:
Rick Douglas Husband: Born
July 12, 1957, Rick was married and had two children. Rick was a
Colonel in the United States Air Force as well as a NASA Astronaut.
Michael P. Anderson: Born December
25, 1959, Michael was married.
Michael was a Lieutenant Colonel in the
United States Air Force as well as a
NASA Astronaut.
Laurel Clark: Born Born March 10,
1961 Laurel was married and had one
child. Laurel was a Commander in
the United States Navy as well as a NASA Astronaut.
William C. McCool: Born September
23, 1961, William was married.
William was a Commander in the United
States Navy as well as a NASA
Astronaut.
Ilan Ramon: 48 years old, Ilan was
married and had four children. Ilan was a Colonel in the Israeli Air Force
as well as a NASA Astronaut.
Kalpana Chawla: : Born January 7,
1961, Kalpana was married and had no
children. She had a PH D and was a NASA
Astronaut.
David M Brown: Born April 16, 1956
David was not married and had no
children. David was a Captain in
the United States Navy as well as a NASA
Astronaut.
In God's Hands
As the last friends wander home
having said all they could say
And for now you're left alone
when you settle down to pray
As night descends upon you
with the loss that you must face
It could be rather comforting
to think about a better place
As you bow your head in silence
for the ones who have gone home
Remember that you'll meet again
God's promised you won't be alone
As daytime turns to nighttime
and night becomes day again
shed no tears for the lost ones
who in your heart always remain
As you hold your head up high
when you're trying not to grieve
trust in God to help you see
that it was their time to leave
As you finally come to realize
that there were bigger plans
For those who will be missed
and now are in God's hands
Author: Sharon Schafer
February 3, 2003
For the families and friends
of
the crew of the shuttle
Columbia.
May they all rest in peace.
The flags at the Washington Monument flew
at half-staff Saturday, February 1, 2003
to
honor the seven Astronauts.
A private meeting was held with the family
members of the Astronauts on the
day after the shuttle exploded, Sunday,
February 2, 2003. Evelyn Husband,
the wife of Rick Husband has this to say
about the meeting:
''They are doing remarkably well. We've
gotten strength from each
other, and it was great to see them
yesterday. We just cried and
laughed and hugged each other, and
it was very helpful.''
On the Today show, Monday morning, Evelyn
read this statement:
"On January 16th we saw our loved ones
launch into a brilliant,
cloud-free sky. Their hearts were full
of enthusiasm, pride in country,
faith in their God and a willingness
to accept risk in the pursuit of
knowledge - knowledge that might improve
the quality of life for
all mankind. 'Although we grieve deeply,
as do the families of
Apollo I and Challenger before us,
the bold exploration of space must
go on. Once the root cause of this
tragedy is found and corrected, the
legacy of Columbia must carry on for
the benefit of our children
and yours.''
Comments from the astronauts
Rick Husband - Rick had decided
as a young child that he wanted to be an
astronaut. "It's been pretty
much a lifelong dream and just a thrill to be able to get to actually live
it out"
Michael Anderson - "I take the
risk because I think what we're doing is really important. If you look
at this research flight and if you really take an
opportunity to look at each experiment
... the potential yield that we have is
really tremendous. For me, it's the
fact that what I'm doing can have great
consequences and great benefits for
everyone, for mankind"
Kalpana Chawla - When first becoming
an astronaut in 1994, she wanted to
build aircraft, the space program had
not entered her mind. She stated:
"That would be too far-fetched''
David Brown - When he was asked
about the risk of space travel he has this
to say: "I made a decision that is
part of my job, I would incur some real risk as a routine part of my job
when I joined the Navy and started flying ... airplanes off of ships, particularly
airplanes off of ships at night. And I think that was a decision that I
made some years ago and the decision to go fly in space is just an extension
of that"
Laurel Clark - "I think my family
has a fairly practical and pragmatic view of this whole thing, and that's
that the actual launching into space is much more dangerous than any of
the other security concerns. There's a lot of different things that we
do during life that could potentially harm us and I choose not to stop
doing those things"
Ilan Ramon - When asked if he was
nervous or afraid he had this to say:
"I think the only thing that will worry
me is the launch sequence and the systems and the launch, being launched
on time. The tenseness is there because everybody wants to be launched
on time with no failures. That's it. Once you're there, you're there''
Comments from others about the astronauts
Michael Anderson
Michael's mother had this to say:
'He told me some years ago the word
'can't' should be taken out of the dictionary because there wasn't nothing
that can't be done,''
Reverend Simmons from Michael's family
church has this to say:
''He was a young man who would always
think deep,
He never said much. ... He would listen
to what I said,
especially scientific things.''
Laurel Clark
Laurel's brother had this to say:
"She was my big sister. Heroes to me
are something other,
something big. All of them are heroes.
They were
serving humanity.''
Laurel's mother had this to say:
''She loved to take hikes be outdoors,'her
favorite thing to do
at home was taking care of her flowers.
She worried about
them not getting watered when she was
away.''
Reverend Tony Larson read from one of Laurel's
final e-mails sent from the
space shuttle Columbia where she told
of looking at the earth and finding it
to be "truly awe-inspiring.''
Rick Husband
One of Ricks Professors had this to say:
''If you just wanted an all-American
boy, that was Rick''
Dr. Thomas Burton, director of the engineering
department, had this to say:
''He was just a wonderful guy,He was
famous around here,
regarded as a hero, but he never let
it affect him.
He was always low-key and unassuming"
Ilan Ramon
Ilan's wife had this to say:
"He was such an optimist that he didn't
even write a will.
He thought it was unnecessary"
Ilan's wife said that during lift off,
her five
year old daughter didn't seem to be celebrating
like those around her, she simply said
''I lost my Daddy.'' ''Apparently she
knew''
William McCool
William's Father had this to say:
"There's nothing that can prepare you
for the loss of
a son or a daughter''
Williams Mother had this to say:
''He had a great smile; he had a great
personality to go with
that smile. He was outgoing, upbeat,
always positive''
Witnesses said:
Doug Ruby and his father were on their
way to go fishing when when
they saw the shuttle explode:
"It was right at 8 a.m. We saw it coming
across the sky real bright and shiny and all in one piece. We thought it
was the sun shining off an airplane. Then it broke up in about six pieces,
they were all balls of fire, before it went over the tree line''
Patricia Hernandez saw
"fire in the sky, like the sky was
falling"
Chris Linville was working when he took
a break to go outside and
watch the shuttle:
"We went outside to see if it was landing.
We saw a streak going across
the sky. From the viewpoint we had,
we did see some flames. We knew
it was flying over, and we were actually
looking for the shuttle passing
by. We had no idea''
While taking a walk, U.S. Sen. Kay Bailey
Hutchison
"heard this boom, which I thought was
the breaking of the sound
barrier. It's a shock and it just brings
home to you that when we are
exploring in space and pushing the
envelope that we can't be 100
percent accurate''
All pictures, comments
and infomation collected from the internet
and from various news
stories are used here for education purposes
only and are copyrighted
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