February 1, 2003 was a Saturday. It was shaping up as a slow news day. Saturdays usually are. At the cable and broadcast network newsrooms the arrival and landing of Shuttle Columbia was just another small story--really not much more than a time filler on that winter's day.

Of course that's not what actually happened. A small incident, virtually unnoticed at launch, doomed Columbia's reentry.

"...a large piece of insulating foam from Columbia's external tank (ET) had come off during ascent and struck the leading edge of the left wing, causing critical damage."

Though preliminary conclusions were published in 1983in 2003 and the remaining shuttle fleet resumed missions in 2005 it wasn't until this past Tuesday that we got the full story of the Columbia accident. It is a chilling and often gruesome report told in technical terms, but with little left to the imagination. Because the flight was so well monitored and documented this forensic retelling is factually weighty.

There were five distinct events each with the potential to kill the crew.

The first event with lethal potential was depressurization of the crew module, which started at or shortly after orbiter breakup.

The second event with lethal potential was unconscious or deceased crew members exposed to a dynamic rotating load environment with nonconformal helmets and a lack of upper body restraint.

The third event with lethal potential was separation from the crew module and the seats with
associated forces, material interactions, and thermal consequences. This event is the least understood due to limitations in current knowledge of mechanisms at this Mach number and altitude. Seat restraints played a role in the lethality of this event.

The fourth event with lethal potential was exposure to near vacuum, aerodynamic accelerations, and cold temperatures.

The final event with lethal potential was ground impact.

This is a 400 page report. Any insight I can give here will be superficial at best. Still, I was struck by the separation of problem solving and survival that existed in astronaut training. Though the crew knew something was going wrong they never prepared for the rapid depressurization that came.

[R]ecovered crew equipment shows crew visors were in the nominal (up) position rather than emergency configuration (down and locked). Inspection of the wrist and glove rings showed that the glove wrist rings were not attached to the suit for two crew members on the middeck and one crew member on the flight deck, and one crew member had not yet donned the helmet. The change (from the crew's vantage point) from a nominal entry profile to the LOC (loss of control) and subsequent separation of the forebody from the orbiter all occurred in approximately 40 seconds. Experience shows that this is not sufficient time to don gloves and helmet

This report is loaded with conclusions and recommendations, but the truth is travel in pursuit of exploration is inherently dangerous. The astronauts knew this going in. Though their vehicle was modern their danger wasn't all that different from what faced Columbus, Lewis and Clark, Shackleton or anyone else who has pushed the physical limits of human knowledge.