Twenty years ago today... :-(

[prfesser]

We lost the Shuttle Columbia. I was halfway to Louisville when I heard it on the radio. All I could think was "ogod, not again..."

 

[Rob Campbell]

I remember getting up in the morning and checking the news on line and reading about it. Absolutely tragic.

 

[Hobie1dog]

I can't remember where I was when that happened. I remember where I was during 9/11 but not the shuttle disasters.

 

[Blast it Tom!]

I was at work; I wasn't as shocked this time as they had said about the damage concern from the foam they'd seen strike it, but the sadness was the same as Apollo 1 & Challenger. What an awful call those engineers had to make, try it or not? With rescue being a long shot, and modeling/predicting with the information they had being very difficult, what do you do? You do your best and pray and I'm sure you weep when it comes out that wrong.

 

[tsmith1315]

It was the day our son was diagnosed with tuberous sclerosis. I watched the shuttle trouble unfold from the waiting room.

 

[jsdemar]

One year after the Columbia disaster, I started working at the NASA Scientific Balloon Facility in East Texas. My office was in the hangar/building where the pieces were collected.
I went to the 1-year memorial in nearby Lufkin TX (heart of the recovery area) and got to talk with people from NASA and the recovery teams. It's a dense pine forest region. Some debris were found years later.
The facility where I worked was renamed the NASA COLUMBIA Scientific Balloon Facility in 2005 (I think), with a ceremony attending by employees and NASA astronauts and directors. I changed jobs in 2006.

 

[bobby_hamill]

I was on my way from a friends home in Norfolk Va to my home in North Carolina by way of Hwy 58 when I heard of the
Columbia Disaster over the radio. I pulled over to the side of the road and cried like a baby and said a prayer for the crew
and their family's.

Then I remembered the poem "High Flight" Narrated by William Conrad that would play when the local TV station
would go off air and remembered the line " I put out my hand and touched the face of God " And thought the astronauts
have touched the face of god and I managed to smile through my pain.

 

[conneryc]

I was at work in Tyler, TX and heard the sonic booms of the pieces falling, which ended up all around the area near me.

 

[teepot]

I was on a golf course. Teed off at 6am. If I had looked up I would have seen the pieces flying over head. The path went right over Vegas.

 

[Antares JS]

I was in high school and was woken up by a phone call from one of the other members of the rocket club. I ran downstairs and told my parents to turn the news on. Our rocket that year had a paint scheme modeled after the astronaut memorial wall.

 

[Jim Hinton]

I was in Midland, TX. I was moving my Mom. I remember it well when it came over the radio.

Jim

 

[cls]

A friend was in Tehachapi, watching through binoculars. Saw many glowing things, not just one. Is still traumatized today.

 

[T-Rex]

I was at home in Virginia. Turned on the TV just in time to see the "Breaking News" screen pop up.

 

[Pat Gordzelik]

I was at my home office in Amarillo, Texas that cold Panhandle morning. I had let my employees off that day, it had been a slow week, and business had been down. Plus, as I told my wife Lauretta that morning, that I had a nagging ill feeling, and needed some time alone.

I was worried about a friend of mine. In high school he and I had built a model of a Saturn 5 Estes rocket model. We launched it in a church parking lot in front of my grandmothers house ( where I used to live a few years growing up just a few miles from my office) at 4612 Buffalo Trail, and it arked over to the west (yes, I know, we were irresponsible 15/16 year olds but with a zeal for rocketry that over ruled common sense).
We could see it descend and I drove my car (1966 Chev Impala, I had a hardship license and was older than my friend) and found the remains. It had impacted on the roof of a two story house. As we collected the remnants of our model, the wife of the house, came out and berated us as being 'irresponsible" (which we were) and that we would never amount to anything.

Back to the after the "event".
The City of Amarillo decided to rename the Airport from the "Amarillo International Airport" to the "Rick Husband International Airport".
The whole family and friends were there to commemorate the event, to honor the local boy who was the Commander of the Space Shuttle mission who lost his life in the pursuit of the career he loved.

At the presentation stage at the airport, this little old lady approached me ( I had been asked by the family and Ricks wife Helen to be there), looked up at me, and said "Mr Gordzelik, years ago I told you and Astronaut Husband when you were kids that you would never amount to anything. I was wrong. I am so sorry for your loss". She was the woman whose house Rick and I had impacted with our model.
What could I do? I stepped off that stage and hugged her as hard as she hugged me.

Several years later, I was doing workshops at Texas Tech University in the Engineering dept teaching rocketry to high school teachers. There was pictures of Rick in the halls on various missions in space. I had my high school annual there, where Rick had signed "Pat, I'll send you pictures from space. 1972."

Pat G

 

[Hobie1dog]

thanks for sharing that story Pat.

 

[Pat Gordzelik]

thanks for sharing that story Pat.

Appreciate that Hobie,

It was a hard story to share. Rick and I were were pretty close, we even tried to share the same girl friend in high school. I won that one, but as it turns out he won, she ran off with a politician.
Yet another story...