Some remains from the seven-member crew of the space shuttle Columbia have been recovered in rural east Texas, and forensics experts think the astronauts could be genetically identified despite the orbiter’s disintegration 39 miles overhead. NASA officials said Sunday that there have been at least three reports of local officials finding body parts found on farmland and along rural roads near the Texas-Louisiana state line. That’s the same region where the search for shuttle debris is concentrating. Among the remains recovered are a charred torso, thigh bone and skull with front teeth, and a charred leg. An empty astronaut’s helmet also could contain some genetic traces. Bob Cabana, director of flight crew operations, had said earlier Sunday that remains of all seven astronauts had been found, but later corrected himself. Experts said the identification process for the seven astronauts who died in the accident may depend on DNA testing.
Despite the hundreds and hundreds of debris sightings swamping law enforcement officials in Texas, recognizable portions of the crew’s capsule had not yet been found. “If the bodies had been removed from the safeguard of the cabin, they would have totally burned up and very little could be recovered,” Fink said. If the bodies were shielded by portions of the cabin until impact with the ground, he said, identification would be easier. Columbia’s crew had no chance of surviving after the shuttle broke up at 207,135 feet above Earth. The spacecraft was exposed to re-entry temperatures of 3,000 degrees while traveling at 12,500 mph, or 18 times the speed of sound.
—I must say, I’m surprised they are finding as much as they are; I wonder if they’ll be able to tell how they died? I just hope some wingnut doesn’t post photos. (And that guy who erected a cross over the site of some of the remains—I know he meant well, but not everyone on board was a Christian!)
I remember when Payne Stewart died, they said the sudden decompression at that altitude likely rendered everone onboard unconscious almost immediately, and their altitude and speed was just a fraction of Columbia’s.
I’d wondered about this as well, from a non-morbid, scientific perspective, if people would undergo the same physical changes as metals, composites, etc. However they died, I pray it was quick and painless.
How much more specficially do you want to know how they died? When forces are considerably less it’s possible to identify specifics but there is a point where you just have to say “blunt force trauma.”
It’s possible the crew may have known of the impending breakup very briefly but once the cabin was breached I’d bet it was over for them in milliseconds.
Putting up a cross may not always be appropriate but I think even non-Christians would see that as a well meaning gesture. I’m sure someone may have thought to put a star of David up as well.
Would a person generate heat upon re-entry all by themselves or is the only reason they were burned because of being in a spacecraft that’s itself generating enormous voulmes of heat?
I remember that when the skydiver with oxygen jumped out of a balloon at around 100,000 feet that it was extreme cold that he had to deal with. In other words, does the fact the astronauts were burned indicate they were not immediately ejected from the spacecraft?
Did anyone else hear of some guy calling Howard Stern’s show on Saturday, I think, stating that he had found some astronaut’s teeth on his property? I think this guy said he was from Dallas area. Why do people do this if it isn’t true?
Far from the suspected impact sight of the cabin, or what was left of it. Frankly, I am amazed that there is anything identifiable left, human or craft.
I did see footage of a large body bag being loaded into a funeral car, Mr. Ujest and I couldn’t imagine an entire body itself surviving such an ordeal like that, so we were guessing that it was the seat or space suit too.
i say straight out that i’m a programmer, not a “physical” scientist, but regarding heat, reentry, et al. …
yes, unfortunately, a person would generate heat. ANYTHING will generate heat at that speed/height. you’re meeting resistance from the very air molecules themselves. resistance = friction = heat.
and as for anything surviving… some very wacky things happen at the physical level under extreme conditions/situations. people have been known to be thrown back from a bomb detonation by the percussive blast when it “goes”, sustaining only minor injuries that are probably more associated with the “stop” than the “go”. when the plane hit the Pentagon on 9/11, there was a massive firestorm that incinerated people and materials…yet i have a picture of the U.S. Marine Corps standard, still in situ and upright on its office flagpole, that was not even singed, even though the remainder of the office is open space.
so, yes, circumstances could allow for something as fragile as human tissue to make it back to terra firma. the world and its physics is full of strange, wonderful and wacky things.
I’m just amazed no one on the ground was hit by debris. Some of the debris fell on public school property. I suppose we can be grateful the crew was not coming home on a school day.
Probably no one was. Course, if they were it’s quite unlikely they’d have lived to tell about it so I guess we won’t actually know until an exhaustive search has been completed. Still, you’re right, so far it’s been nothing short of miraculous.
Captain Joe Kittinger, USAF, participant in the “Man-High” program. He’s also the only person to accellerate past Mach 1 without an aircraft (on the jump you’re remembering). A broken seal on his pressure suit caused cold air to leak into his glove and he had some mild frostbite as a result. He wasn’t going fast enough for the heat to be an issue - the shuttle broke up at 18 times the speed of sound, where air friction was heating the leading edges of the wings to 3000 degrees fahrenheit. Between the air impact and the friction, the crew would have been dead in an instant. I’m amazed any remains are being found.
Incredible to me how big some of the pieces of debris are- the size of cars, etc. I suppose it’s good that there are remains for the family to bury.
About souvenirs, Eve, I think it’s pretty interesting how apparently some with ‘legitimate’ Columbia-related memorabilia added the words “not debris.” in their eBay listings.
Even the hardcore eBay addicts are furious at the idea of selling remains or debris as souvenirs.
Also it seems that many of the proceeds are designated for a memorial fund for the astronauts’ families. For example, a seller from Worchester, Mass., is offering a “rare collection of stamps” of the Columbia to aid the fund. That is pretty cool.
Let’s put a stop to that myth right now. It isn’t the friction of air that generates the heat, it’s the compression. Once an object has passed the local speed of sound, air builds up in front of it faster than it can escape around the sides, and begins to compress. When a gas is compressed, its temperature increases per various gas laws I won’t get into here. Friction plays only a small part in the heating effect.
The person who called Dan Rather on Saturday was making a crank call saying he had found BABABOOEY’S teeth (a Howard Stern producer name) in his backyard. It’s a standard ‘joke’ for howard stern listeners to call in during national tragedies since they know it will be LIVE. The object is to say something dealing with Howard Stern live on national t.v., and they do it every time, no matter how terrible the tragedy.
This is correct; I was going to post this, but you beat me to it. My cite is The Bad Astronomer’s book, wherein he describes the effect with respect to meteors. He admits previously ascribing the heat to friction, but that the correct explanation is the pressure.
I was initially surprised that body parts had been found, but, morbid fellow and physicist that I am, I gave the issue some thought and decided that there are several effects involved. The first thing to realise is that the Orbiter is deliberately trying to slow down in the upper atmosphere. It’s a big mass with lots of velocity and most of this kinetic energy has to be dispersed during re-entry. Coming in flat-on means that you get rid of as much of this early on as possible. You don’t want to be trying to lose that in the much denser lower atmosphere.
However fragment that big mass into much smaller pieces and, for a start, they fall through the upper atmosphere much more easily. But in the lower atmosphere they have a terminal velocity much lower than a big glider-shaped object trying to land aerodynamically. From the condition objects have been found on the ground, they’re surely much slower than Mach 1 at lower altitudes. Hence they evade the compression heating effect totally in the densest part of the atmosphere. Unlike an intact Orbiter would, if it were not do the braking manoeuvers early on during re-entry.
Any comparison with Challenger is probably not very useful. My understanding there is that, while the crew died very quickly, the cabin probably survived intact until impacting the Atlantic. Only pieces - bones and the like - were recovered, but this fragmentation was entirely due to the final impact.
I doubt that a precise cause of death will be ascertainable from the remains. However, unlike in 1986, individual remains will surely be assignable to individuals by DNA testing and, particularly given the procedures post-9/11, I expect this will be done. As I recall, the Challenger remains were interred in a communal burial. I refuse to pass judgement on any decisions the berieved families may make in the present circumstances, but this may be a delicate precedent in the months to come.
The Howard Stern Show is only aired live during weekdays, not over the weekend. If you are referring to the E! show then you would be sorely mistaken since that show is taped and not aired live. Thank you for making up stories though.
