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<p>WASHINGTON (AP) -- One day before the Columbia disaster, senior NASA engineers raised concerns the shuttle's left wing might burn off and cause the deaths of the crew, describing a scenario much like the one investigators believe happened. They never sent their warnings to NASA's brass.</p>

SPACE CENTER, Houston (AP) -- The board investigating the Columbia tragedy said Tuesday it wants to know more about a mysterious object that almost certainly fell off the shuttle and was flying alongside the spacecraft during its second day in orbit. Meanwhile, NASA said late Tuesday night that a videotape from inside Columbia's cockpit has been recovered from the wreckage and shows four of the astronauts just before their ship began experiencing trouble.Thirteen minutes of tape were preserved; the rest was burned. The tape ends four minutes after the shuttle's atmospheric entry, while the shuttle is still over the Pacific...

Shuttle Probe Chief Not Seeking Scapegoat The retired four-star admiral leading the inquiry into what caused the space shuttle Columbia tragedy is described as a charismatic problem-solver who may hold the key to the public's acceptance of the board's findings. Harold W. Gehman Jr., who led the probe into the 2000 terrorist bombing of the USS Cole, said the shuttle investigation is similar in some ways. The report will not name names; it will look at NASA's bureaucracy. "The way I like to describe it," he said recently, "is individuals don't need to worry about anything. ... But if you...

NASA Searches Nev. for Columbia Debris NASA Says Radar Tracked Columbia Debris Falling Into Eastern Nevada Near Utah Border LAS VEGAS Feb. 20 — NASA said late Thursday that what is believed to be debris from space shuttle Columbia was tracked falling into eastern Nevada by air traffic control radar. The sheriff in Lincoln County, Nev., said NASA officials requested his department begin searching the rural county near the Utah border. "They just said they had tracked it by radar and gave us a projected point of impact," Sheriff Dahl Bradfield said. Imagery, trajectory and ballistics experts have been analyzing...

opinion Why That Texas Town is Named “Palestine” Dr. Rafael Medoff 19 February 2003 The fact that the space shuttle Columbia broke apart in the vicinity of a Texas town named “Palestine” has been the subject of much conversation in the Middle East. In Cairo, the New York Times reports, “the average cafe denizen” noted the presence of an Israeli astronaut on board, as well as the reports “that it apparently began crumbling over Palestine, Texas,” and concluded that Allah was punishing America for supporting Israel. In the Gulf kingdom known as the United Arab Emirates, a newspaper columnist expressed...

Feb. 19, 2003 ADL: Accounts on net blaming Israel, Jews for Columbia's downing proliferating By MELISSA RADLER NEW YORK - Conspiracy theories blaming Jews and Israel for the disintegration of NASA space shuttle Columbia last month are circulating the Internet at an alarming rate, the Anti-Defamation League said Wednesday. The online hate speech, tracked by the ADL on Web sites, chat rooms, bulletin boards and e-mails, includes allegations the US and Israel destroyed the Columbia to divert attention from the Iraq conflict, that Israeli astronaut Ilan Ramon was a spy, and that Jews and Israelis were complicit in the shuttle's...

HOUSTON -- There are no firm answers yet as to exactly why shuttle Columbia broke apart Feb. 1, but with public hearings set to start next week, a new wave of theories is beginning to make the rounds.This week's best guess as to what happened involves a stripped heat protection panel from the leading edge of the left wing, taking into account two facts recently confirmed by the Columbia Accident Investigation Board, chaired by former Navy Admiral Hal Gehman. First, a major contributor to the loss of the vehicle and crew appears to be the presence of superheated air inside...

Board: Shuttle Lost Parts Over Calif. SPACE CENTER, Houston - Space shuttle Columbia began losing pieces over the California coast well before it disintegrated over Texas, the accident investigation board reported Tuesday, finally confirming what astronomers and amateur skywatchers have been saying from Day One. But board member James Hallock, a physicist and chief of the Transportation Department's aviation safety division, said the fragments were probably so small they burned up before reaching the ground. He said the conclusion that the space shuttle was shedding pieces a full six minutes before it came apart over Texas was based on images...

No Accident But a Clear Message from G-d This word is written two weeks after the disastrous tragedy that befell the Columbia Space Shuttle. During these two weeks I have felt that this terrible event was not just an accident but was a clear message from G-d to all mankind, especially to the United States and Israel who participated in this flight. I feel that I can no longer hold this within my heart but that I have to share it with everyone, as I am sure G-d expects me to do. This godly message has great importance for all...

Earth monitors recorded explosions on Columbia Experts won't say if infrasound readings coincide with 'electrical zap' on camera As NASA continues its probe into the precise cause of the space shuttle Columbia disaster, government researchers are confirming the recording of explosions as the orbiter broke apart during its fatal descent. According to a report in the Toledo Blade, some scientists believe the recordings could shed light on the theory that an electrical phenomenon called a "blue jet" knocked the shuttle out of the sky. "We have detected sounds from shuttle re-entries in the past," Dr. Alfred Bedard Jr. of the...

NASA Asks Farmers to Look Out for Debris NASA Asks Farmers to Look Out for Shuttle Debris in Spring Plowing; Fewer Pieces Being Found As the days become weeks since Columbia's disintegration over Texas, fewer and fewer pieces of space shuttle wreckage are turning up, even though the calls keep coming in. On Monday, NASA asked farmers and ranchers out West to be on the lookout during spring plowing for anything that might have fallen from the sky on Feb. 1. "It's kind of a mixed thing. There's a tremendous amount of information available already, even though not everything directly...

Agonizing Decision Awaits if Root Cause of Disaster Remains Elusive Hard as they try and long as they take, NASA engineers may never isolate the exact, root cause of the Columbia's fatal disintegration. If it comes to that, the implications for the future of the space shuttles and the International Space Station could be profound, astronautical engineers and policy analysts say. Will shuttle flights have to be shut down while modifications are made on all suspect systems? Or will NASA make some changes, and accept other risks, to send the shuttles back into orbit sooner? In either case, the decision...

HOUSTON - The panel investigating the loss of the space shuttle Columbia said Thursday that a hole developed in its aluminum skin, allowing superheated gas to flow into the left wing, causing the ship's destruction. "Preliminary analysis by a NASA working group this week indicates that the temperature indications seen in Columbia's left wheel well during entry would require the presence of plasma," the superheated gas that surrounds the shuttle as it enters the atmosphere, the board said in a statement released late Thursday. The statement from the board, led by retired Adm. Harold W. Gehman Jr., means that engineers...

ALBUQUERQUE, N.M. (AP) - The shadowy, closely-analyzed photo of space shuttle Columbia's underside was not snapped with cutting-edge military equipment, but by three researchers playing around with an old computer and an ordinary telescope in their free time, officials said Wednesday. The grainy photo was made Feb. 1 at the Starfire Optical Range at Kirtland Air Force Base and released Friday by NASA. It shows what appears to be a suspicious bulge on the shuttle's wing shortly before it broke apart. But contrary to reports last week, the photo was not snapped by one of Starfire's extraordinarily powerful telescopes,...

Hearings Open at Capitol With Vast Range of Queries for NASA WASHINGTON, Feb. 11 — When lawmakers convene on Wednesday morning for a hearing on the space shuttle disaster, they will examine both the technical aspects of the tragedy and broader issues about safety, costs and the ultimate goals of the nation's space program. The laundry list of questions to be put to NASA's administrator, Sean O'Keefe, will go to the heart of the manned space program. Did NASA undercut shuttle safety by shifting money to other programs? Can the space agency investigate itself, or is a more independent body...

MATTHEW FORDAHL, Associated Press WriterFriday, February 7, 2003 ©2003 Associated Press URL: http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?f=/news/archive/2003/02/07/state1114EST0040.DTL (02-07) 08:14 PST SAN FRANCISCO (AP) -- Federal scientists are investigating whether electricity or some other little-understood phenomena in the upper atmosphere might have doomed the space shuttle Columbia. Investigators also are reviewing data recorded by a network of instruments that might have detected a faint thunderclap at the same time a purplish bolt of lightning may have struck the shuttle high above Earth, the San Francisco Chronicle reported. Researchers at NASA's Kennedy Space Center raised concerns in a report last year that electromagnetic phenomena or ice...

NASA Questioned Shuttle's Ability to Land WASHINGTON -- NASA engineers questioned whether damage from extreme heat during Columbia's fiery descent could cause its tires to fail on the runway, despite assurances days earlier that possible damage to insulating tiles near the landing gear wouldn't imperil the shuttle's safe return. Since Columbia's breakup over Texas, senior NASA officials have expressed repeated confidence in conclusions by engineers at The Boeing Co., its contractor, that the shuttle could return safely despite the risks of damage to delicate thermal tiles on its left wing that might have occurred on liftoff. In prepared testimony for...

<p>Federal scientists are looking for evidence that a bolt of electricity in the upper atmosphere might have doomed the space shuttle Columbia as it streaked over California, The Chronicle has learned.</p> <p>Investigators are combing records from a network of ultra-sensitive instruments that might have detected a faint thunderclap in the upper atmosphere at the same time a photograph taken by a San Francisco astronomer appears to show a purplish bolt of lightning striking the shuttle.</p>

People in the News LITTLE ROCK (AP) - Former President Bill Clinton will debut with the Arkansas Symphony Orchestra on the March 25 program "Let Freedom Ring," a celebration of the American spirit that pays tribute to the seven Columbia astronauts. Clinton will narrate Aaron Copland's "Lincoln Portrait," which includes excerpts from speeches by Abraham Lincoln and the Rev. Martin Luther King Jr. The orchestra will perform Gustav Holst's "Jupiter," the fourth movement of Holst's seven-movement suite "The Planets," to honor the astronauts who died when the space shuttle Columbia broke apart before landing on Feb. 1. Foreman native...

The Columbia Accident Investigation Board (CAIB) will conduct its first press conference on Tuesday, Feb. 11, at 3 p.m. EST. The press briefing is in the Teague auditorium at the Johnson Space Center, Houston. Board Chairman, retired Navy Admiral Harold W. Gehman Jr., and other board members, will discuss their activities to date, CAIB structure, and plans for the investigation. Other board members are: * Maj. Gen. John L. Barry, Director, Plans and Programs, Headquarters USAF Materiel Command, Wright Patterson AFB, Ohio; * Brig. Gen Duane W. Deal, Commander 21st Space Wing, Peterson AFB, Colo.; * James Hallock, Massachusetts Institute...