New Video Over California May Show Columbia Shuttle Debris

KRON San Francisco ^ | February 6, 2003

[Shermy]

FAIRFIELD (KRON) -- New video that KRON 4 has obtained from a photographer in Fairfield shows possible debris breaking off of the shuttle Columbia as it flew over California just minutes before losing contact with NASA.

The focus of this investigation is a very faint glitter on this tape. It looks as if a spec or two falls off the back of the shuttle as it was traveling at about 17,000 miles an hour overhead.

If you watch closely, you can see a few little dim specs. Is it anything? It's a good question.

We enhanced the video at the moment that came off, and can you see that it's just that little spec that we're interested in right now, just that little bit of debris from the back of the shuttle.

We really have no idea what it is. We have no doubt, though, that NASA will be interested in looking at it.

When the videotape was shot from Fairfield, Lionel Machado said the shuttle at that time appeared perfectly normal.

"It was a beautiful day, I could see it very well and we could see the trail behind it above our house," says Machado, who shot the video. "Then as it got maybe directly North, it went off that direction and then disappeared in the North/Northeast."

KRON 4 Science Editor Brian Hackney also talked with a local expert about what the possible debris was.

"It's hard to tell what it is, but I don't believe it's an artifact of the camera," says Buddy Nelson, a Space and Science Expert in Fremont who studied the video this afternoon. "I think we are seeing something coming off the back of the orbiter, possibly a piece of the structure itself or potentially a natural occurrence of plasma breaking up behind the shuttle."

"You don't think it's ice?"

"No, I don't. That would dissipate in the vacuum of space."

"What are the chances that whatever that thing is survived to the ground, to become debris?"

"Reasonably small," says Nelson. "We're talking 47 miles up. It's going very fast. If it's small, it will continue to burn. Because it's along the trajectory path, it's going to burn up."

"This is something NASA will be interested in?"

"Absolutely. They'll look at the timing of these two occurrences. They'll look at the telemetry. They will see if there's any correlation between the movement on the flight surfaces and these two events."

"It's also curious at the moment that that was taken, about 9 or 8 minutes before the hour of 6:00 that morning was the very moment the things began to go wrong on the shuttle."

KRON 4 is working on this developing story and will have more details tonight starting on KRON 4 News at 4pm.

[discostu]

You can see forever but knowing where you are is another matter entirely. Everything looks very different from the top than how we're used to seeing it. I can never get my bearing coming into TIA until I can see the terminal. Once in a blue moon I can spot Old Tucson but once I lose it I'm lost again.

[theFIRMbss]

>Of course this could all just be because I'm in a foul mood lately.

This is way off-thread,
but I recently saw this
very silly film

and it cheered me up.
There's nothing mean spirited
in it, just fun stuff...

[El Gato]

Green, one eyed.

You sure that wasn't "Purple, one-eyed, one-horned" and "flying"?

[El Gato]

I may be wrong about this, but this looks like the video that was taken by those kids in New Mexico that morning. Are you sure this was from California?

Those are two different shots. Notice the different time stamps. One would be Mountain time, the other Pacific, corresponding to the period that the shuttle was flying from California to Texas.

[eno_]

Seems to me there are a lot of people obsessed with proving the shuttle started falling apart over CA. Why?

Because we think it wasn't a total suprise that there were more problems later. The whole "we almost made it" spin feels bogus.

[Shermy]

The video at post # 4 is, for one, the New Mexico video. This is a different one - there are video links at the KRON link above showing this new California video.

[Tamzee]

The video of this sequence is really clear.... it's quite sad in retrospect to hear the kids exclaiming over seeing odd pieces coming off :-(

Tammy

[dtel]

Here is my gut feeling, and I get this from Dittemore's demeanor and body language.
They knew there was some damage, or strongly thought there was the possibilty of damage.
A key factor is the weight of the load, the heaviest ever, from what I have seen on here.
The heating also occurred above the wing on the fuselage, this tells me the angle of entry was somehow skewed.
Dittemore indicated in the first or second conference that they were trying to bring the bird in as safely as possible.
This is not an innocent remark to me.
It indicates they thought even safer methods than normal were in order, which brings me to this.

They did their best to make up for what they thought may have been a damaged wing, the heavy payload got unbalanced and tilted, exposing the unprotected fuselage to the atmospheric heat.
By the time it got to Dallas, it was in major trouble if not tumbling. Because within 60 miles of Dallas (3 Seconds, Shuttle time) it blew up.
The noise it made, indicates to this ear that it was twirling if not tumbling at the time it blew up.
It sounded like a tornado coming through the air.

That is my prognosis and I'll stick by it until proven otherwise.

[narby]

If you heard the shuttle, then what you heard were multiple sonic booms from all the pieces. When it came apart at 120k feet, it was too high for a sonic boom, or an explosion to be heard from the ground. Note that SR-71 aircraft flew over the US quite often without a sonic boom, because they were cruising around 80k feet.

Same sort of thing was reported in western austrailia when Skylab came down.

[dtel]

It was not a sonic boom or multiple sonic booms.
It was an EXPLOSION.
I am 80 miles east of Dallas and 60 miles north of Nacogdoches.
You can clearly see the explosion I heard from the initial WFAA video.
My point about the noise is that the tail must have come off before it got to Dallas or about the same time.
It shook the ground when it passed over.
It was NOT areodynamic.

[snopercod]

bump

[dtel]

It wasn't aerodynamic either.

[Bloody Sam Roberts]

Green, one eyed.

Foolish humans! Your technology is no match for our de-orbiting ray!

[eno_]

Dittemore indicated in the first or second conference that they were trying to bring the bird in as safely as possible.

What did he know and when did he know it?

How sad they should have the heaviest shuttle, carrying a heavy load of "science" that ranges from lame high school projects to university and research lab projects that were well-designed but of dubious value anyway.

Since Challenger, it should have been used only for military flights.

[Joe Hadenuf]

Seems to me there are a lot of people obsessed with proving the shuttle started falling apart over CA. Why? Is there some sort of federal grant I haven't heard of that gives the state where a shuttle disaster started a bunch of money? Some parts fell in my home state of AZ, does that make us more worthy?

Huh? WTF are you talking about?

Should we just ignore this video and other possible evidence. Should we just stick our heads in the sand? Do you think the camera man should have just thrown this video in his closet and forgot about it?

Jesh!

[Joe Hadenuf]

I just think it's weird that everytime one CA video get the keibosh another pops up. Seems like some people in CA are looking for a grim peg to hang their hat off of (CA: Where the Columbia first started disintigrating).

LOL! Your an idiot.

You want to bitch about something? Try the Texans who were arrested for collecting and keeping pieces of wreckage.

[Wolfstar]

Given the distance between the camera and the shuttle (47 miles), the object in this photo may not be all that small relative to the size of the shuttle.

[Joe Hadenuf]

I tend to agree with that.

[hole_n_one]

Have you seen this?

There is a video link (Real Player) entitled CA Debris and ABC7 weather camera video on the same page.

[Joe Hadenuf]

Thanks, I'll go check it out.