Shuttle Contact LOST-No Tracking Data During RE-Entry!

Nasa TV | 02/01/03 | GRRRR

[GRRRRR]

Shuttle has NOT been heard from or seen on tracking radar since 0800Hrs CDT. No contact at Merrit Island tracking station, no voice comm...DEVELOPING.

[Mustang]

Hand Salute!....Ready,...Two!

Thank you for your above #1431 post.

Now is the time to offer prayers for our shuttle crew and their loved ones.

Mustang sends.

[Spunky]

This is probably a dumb question--but is there an equivalent of a "black box" on the Columbia that could yield information?

I was just hearing this talked about on TV. They said when you see all those people sitting there at NASA with all the computers and control panels etc. That is equivalent to a black box. They record everything that is going on.

[prairiebreeze]

*They're not Americans - they hate this country. How can anyone who loves their country be so filled with venom*

Agreed. And I'd take it even a step futher, they hate themselves. Even if they won't acknowlege or admit it. It isn't possible to like yourself and speak this way of others.

[The South Park Republican]

Good one!!

[conservativemusician]

That's the scary thing.

It was years after Challenger that NASA got back into space.

[July 4th]

NBC reporting that US spy satellites have recorded an explosion.

[clintonh8r]

Not an expert, but I think the telemetry is blacked out for a period during entry.

[2Jedismom]

Here is the radar loop:

http://www.srh.noaa.gov/radar/loop/DS.p20-r/si.kfws.shtml

[octobersky]

Thank you for the ping! My thoughts and prayers are with the crew and their loved ones.

[txdoda]

Still falling? >>>>>>

Around Athens & Jacksonville.......the last I heard

[Ben Ficklin]

NASA's Mission Status Center is reporting witness reports mentioning parts disassociationg from the shuttle as it crossed California.

Mission Status Center

[Keyes For President]

Sad, sad day.

May God bless the families of those who lost their lives.

[txradioguy]

I understand that.....but the reports I'm getting from the various "experts" on FNC, NBC and ABC are reporting that there was some ice that broke away from the tank and damaged the wing. FNC reports that the Gov. of Arkansas has "possible" debris in three seperate counties.

[NonValueAdded]

gov Huckabee reports debris in 3 counties in Arkansas. Search now moved west into New Mexico. Belief is breakup started before over Texas. Per Tony Snow et al on Fox.

[aristeides]

This was apparently a research-oriented mission. If that's so, it's hard to see why it was vital to launch when they did.

[Helix]

DU links will be allowed on this thread, but this thread only. May the world see what kind of animals DUers are.

you are being kind to them describing them as animals.( Animals have uses. That scum does'nt)

[EternalVigilance]

[BlazingArizona]

No Cockpit Voice Recorders exist. Even if they did, the ability to recover data from them would be extremely difficult (debris will be quite small).

Shuttles have no "black boxes" because they have an inherently better system: continuous telemetry of flight information to the ground. There is no recorder that survive a spacecraft crash, in any case. NASA's approach has just one little flaw: the point in every flight when the re-entry plasma field cuts off communications. Today's breakup happened inside that window.

[Bloody Sam Roberts]

I'm all shook up this morning.

I'm numb right now.

I've been following the US Space Program since I was 10 yrs. old. I'm sure I'll have a good cry later when I get home. I'm at work right now. I have to keep it together for another few hours.
I was on a conference call with engineers in Italy when I saw the news on FR. It was tough to concentrate on their problem at hand let me tell you.

[mikegi]

No, but mountains of telemetry data are available. I suspect the problem right now is not a dearth of information, but an abundance of it. In fact, I would wager that NASA already knows what happened, even if they don't know why.

FoxNews had a video that appears to show the Shuttle oriented 90 degrees from direction of motion. I wish Fox would concentrate on that footage because it seems to me to be the most important in seeing what happened. It was largely intact at the time, which is hard for me to believe given the tremendous stress that would occur.