Lest We Forget...

By Robert Gounley

The loss of Columbia and her crew triggers a flood of memories — triumphs and tragedies alike.

It's been my privilege to witness several pivotal moments of the Space Age. Recalling them gives me a sense of the future.

The autumn night in California's high desert was mild and clear. While my friends dozed, I lay awake admiring the stars.

We had company. A motley crew of fellow campers had settled in beside us. All night long, more came to park motor homes beside pup tents. Security guards directed travelers while portable generators buzzed to power temporary lights. At long intervals, loudspeakers delivered clipped and cryptic announcements in muted voices.

Between short naps, I guessed at the constellations above. The unfamiliar sea of dim stars overwhelmed my view of familiar bright ones. Mildly annoyed at my feeble navigation skills, I settled for spotting the occasional meteor.

Half asleep, I heard a voice. In my dreams, people talk in hushed tones. This wasn't a dream and the voice shook my body down to my dental fillings.

"G-O-O-O-O-D MORNING, DISCOVERY!"

I stood wide-awake and slightly shaking. My sleeping bag had been recently vacated, but I had no clear memory of stepping out.

In a much softer tone, the loudspeakers continued in with a different voice.

"Good morning, Discovery. This is Houston and that was Robin Williams giving your wake-up call. Are you ready to start your day?"

"We are, Houston. Good morning," answered the shuttle astronauts.

The year was 1988. My friends and I were guests at Edwards Air Force Base. We'd come to watch Space Shuttle Discovery land. This was a new experience for them, but I had seen all the shuttles land in California at least once – Columbia, Challenger, Discovery, and Atlantis.

Photo of landing of STS-5 at Edwards AFB

Landing of STS-5, Columbia, at Edwards AFB. Photo courtesy Craig Ward.

At first, shuttle landings drew thousands of visitors. As flights grew more frequent, the crowds dwindled. In the space of a few years, only die-hard space enthusiasts bothered to make the two-hour drive from Los Angeles. When most landings went to Florida, few Californians even noticed.

This shuttle landing was different. It was the first since Challenger exploded over Florida, two and a half years earlier. No one in growing crowd was taking a safe landing for granted.

In 1986, I was an engineer at the Jet Propulsion Laboratory preparing the Galileo spacecraft for its mission to Jupiter. In May, it would to begin its journey with a ride inside Space Shuttle Atlantis. Almost everyone I knew at JPL were working frantically to make everything ready.

Early one January morning, the flight team gathered in a large conference room for one more training lecture. Many of us rubbed sleep from our eyes while others fidgeted, thinking of the work remaining at their desks. There would be a press conference at JPL later that day to present Voyager 2's discoveries at the planet Uranus. In preparation, the TV monitors above our heads were broadcasting the NASA cable channel.

The lecture crept along, interrupted by team members who responded to questions that the speaker had trouble answering. We grew restless and looked up at the TV monitors for relief. A space shuttle was ready to launch. Had anyone asked, few of us could have named the crew or described its mission.

If the lecture had been going better, someone would have turned off the TVs. Instead, following an especially awkward point in the presentation, someone suggested we take a break to watch the launch. As we looked up, Space Shuttle Challenger was clearing the tower.

Initially, events followed the pattern we knew so well. Soon the solid rocket boosters would burn out, then fall away. We were all startled by an apparent early separation. As the seconds dragged by, a growing fireball filled the screen. In horror, we saw pieces dropping from the sky.

We sat in stunned silence. The TV monitor remained mute - no one had the controls or knew where to find them. Someone suggested that the TVs in the cafeteria next door might have their sound on. Desperate for any information, I joined the mob running crowding through the nearest door.

The cafeteria TVs had no sound either. By the time we arrived, NASA cameras were panning downward to show large pieces of debris strike the ocean. If Challenger had escaped the conflagration, we'd be watching a shuttle approaching the runway by now.

Space travel has never been risk-free, but such a massive failure had always seemed a hypothetical event – the worst-case scenario dreamed up by engineers to test how well other engineers thought through a design. This was real. It had human faces. They belonged to sons and daughters, mothers and fathers, husbands and wives who would not be coming home.

It was a day to mourn.

My friends, who woke precisely the same time as me, looked about. We stretched and wiped the dust from our faces. Dawn was fading the stars from view. It was a good time to start the day.

Trading camping gear for cameras and binoculars we trekked towards the dry lakebed. At previous landings, my visitors' pass allowed access to a fence near the main taxiway - only the shuttle's ground crew and a few photographers could be closer to where the shuttle would touch down. Today the taxiway off-limits to everyone but VIPs and security guards. We'd have to make do with the view a few hundred yards further away.

I looked at my watch. Discovery was only a few orbits away from touchdown. Some reference material told me exactly what the shuttle would be doing minute by minute. Every action had to be precise. We knew the consequences if any were not.

After Challenger exploded, no one needed to say that the remainder of our training lecture was cancelled. Some team members went back to their offices, although I doubt anyone could do much there. A few of us met a senior manager who excused us to go home to be with our families. Though I lived alone, my apartment seemed a more comfortable place to be.

It was not a good choice. Every TV station endlessly repeated videotape of the disaster. A phone call to my parents gave little comfort. NASA was supposed to have all the answers, so what were the answers? I didn't know. In the hours following the tragedy, it wasn't clear to me if anyone knew.

The desert sun baked away the morning's chill. Around us, spectators staked out ground for what they thought would be the best view. From experience, I knew precisely where Discovery would first appear. For my friends, I pointed to a point just above the western horizon, then traced a path that circled above our heads before ending with a sweep onto the lakebed runway below. Following a brief caucus, we decided to stay on the upper part of a gentle slope between the main road and the hangars. That let us see the lakebed without the hangars blocking the view.

Discovery was now over the Indian Ocean and beginning its descent. There could be no turning back. In 45 minutes, we'd know if this mission would end in great success or in tragedy. There could be no middle ground.

Large conference rooms at JPL are hard to reserve on short notice. My project arranged for us to meet in the same cafeteria where we had watched Challenger on the day before. The Project Manager had just flown in from Cape Kennedy where he had seen the disaster with his own eyes. Standing on a chair to be seen and heard above the crowd, he talked to us about the many things that were on our minds.

This, I know now, must have been a scene copied all over NASA. In groups large and small, engineers and scientists grieved together. It didn't matter if you were an astronaut or had never met an astronaut. We had lost colleagues. They were the human faces of space exploration. It was a loss we all felt deeply. It was the first day of rebuilding. Not knowing if our mission would ever launch, we began the work to make it possible.

Outside, flags flew at half-staff.

The crowd buzzed with anticipation as landing time grew near. Loudspeakers broadcast Discovery's progress. It was going well.

In the west, the desert sky was very bright. When it first appears, the shuttle is a very small dot against that sky. Binocular don't help then – you see too little of the sky to find your target. Experienced viewers know to squint with unaided eyes.

News comes that the shuttle has crossed the California coast above Ventura. A moment later, it's above Santa Paula. I've driven between those towns and appreciated how fast Discovery was traveling.

Out the corner of my eye, I see someone pointing. Reflexively, everyone begins looking in the same direction together. A tiny, triangular speck has appeared in the sky.

Never moving my gaze, I bring my binoculars to eye level. The speck is now a discernable object with features with well-defined light and dark sections. As it gets closer, the shuttle tilts, presenting the black wings edge on and the white body in full view. The loss of contrast blends it into the bright sky. While briefly growing less visible, the shuttle makes an audible statement, known to all of the regulars.

Two sonic booms, a second apart, shake the desert floor. The crowd cheers. Everyone cranes their necks to watch the shuttle circling overhead, bleeding off its last bits of momentum for the final approach. Any pilot will tell you that a landing is only a controlled fall. Watching a shuttle land, you believe.

Discovery descends in a steep arc towards the lakebed. Even from far away, it is plainly going very fast. When it seems it could wait no longer, the shuttle deploys its landing gear and the rear wheels touch. Still traveling nearly 200 mph, the shuttle's nose gently touches its wheels to the ground and the whole assembly rolls to a stop. Discovery has landed.

Hours later, after Discovery's crew has departed, the ground crew begins its work to bring the shuttle off the runway. My friends and I eagerly snap photos of the shuttle being pulled along the taxiway while a dozen oddly shaped vehicles follow behind – a queen and her entourage. It's a beautiful sight.

The days since Columbia's crash have been difficult. I never wanted to see another shuttle tragedy. Once in a lifetime is too many.

I don't know what the final judgment of history will be. Already, pundits are proffering their opinions – typically the same ones they carried before the accident, uttered with strident conviction. My own judgments will wait until the last bit of data is gathered.

Whatever the future, there are some things I do believe. Astronauts will return to space. Tourists will return to space. In my lifetime, people will return to the Moon and then onto Mars. Call it faith, but it comes from a lifetime of seeing what humans do when confronted with a challenge.

Space exploration could have ended with Challenger. It didn't. A new generation has grown up to determined to make space history, not merely to study it. They have already begun.

For myself, I expect to watch shuttles land again, followed shortly by new generations of vehicles.

California has not heard its last double sonic boom and neither have I.