Kalpana Chawla | Mystery of NASA Columbia Space Disaster | Dhruv Rathee

 

Kalpana Chawla | Mystery of NASA Columbia Space Disaster | Dhruv Rathee

 

Hello, friends!On 1st February, 2003,NASA's Columbia Space Shuttle was returning to Earth.7 astronauts were seated in this shuttle,one of whom was very special for India.Mission Specialist Kalpana Chawla.These astronauts were returning to Earth after spending 2 weeks in space.Their families and friends were waiting for them with bated breath.This flight was special for all of them.But for NASA, it was a routine flight.Because this was the 28th flight of the Space Mission Columbia program.At 08:44 AM,the space shuttle re-entered the Earth's atmosphere.The systems were working as expectedand everything seemed normal.On the Earth, in the Space Center,was the Capsule Communicator CAPCOM Charlie Hobaugh.He was the person communicating with the space shuttle.After a few minutes, Charlie Hobocktalked to the astronauts in the space shuttle about the readings of tire pressure."And Columbia, Houston, we see your tire pressure messages-and we did not copy your last. -Is it instrumentation, MMACS?"On the other hand, Mission Commander Rick Husband was answeringthat suddenly the line gets cut.They only hear one word from him, "Roger."His answer remained unfinished."-those are also off, off-scale. -And Houston, roger, bu... "Charlie Hobaugh tries to establish communication again,but there was no answer from the other side.Ten minutes pass.The attempts continued,but there was still no answer from the other side."HOBAUGH: Columbia, Houston, UHF comm check."This NASA team in the Space Centerwas unaware thatthere was an explosion in the Columbia Space Shuttle.A few minutes later, the Kennedy Space Center gets a call."Switch on the TV and watch the news."Such scenes were seen on the news."They've lost contact.We can only hope thatwhat we're seeing is not the worst."Some people looked up at the skyand this is what they could see.As if a comet was falling to the ground.A blazing light.It broke apart into two,and broke into more pieces.The scattered pieces of this blazing light,were falling to the ground.At 9:12 AM in Texas,the pieces of this spaceship were falling from the sky.By then, NASA had realized thatsomething disastrous had happened.A few hours later, President George Bush addressed the country."My fellow Americans,this day has brought terrible newsand great sadness to our country.the Columbia is lost.There are no survivors.All seven astronauts were k!lledand one of them wasa 40-year-old Indian-born American,Kalpana Chawla.A woman whose story became an inspiration for the whole country.Let's know her story in this video.Kalpana Chawla was born on 17th March 1962in Karnal, Haryana in a conservative family.Her parents Banarasilal Chawla and Sanjyoti Chawlacame to India from Pakistan during the partition.Kalpana was their fourth and youngest child.When she started going to school,she was not formally named.At home, everyone called her Montu.When her elder sister took her to school,they asked her name,we said that we hadn't named her yet.At home, everyone called her by her nickname Montu.So when the need arose, she chose her name herself.Kalpana, which means imagination.At that time, no one would have imagined thatthis young child would go on to do amazing feats in her life.Her brother Sanjay Chawla says thather struggles with society began since her childhood."I will show these boys,I am not a silly girl."Sanjay says that she was a very determined girl.Imagine the 1960s,in Haryana, even today, a male child is preferred in many places.What would have happened in those days?Kalpana Chawla was interested in spaceafter seeing planes flying in the sky.In her childhood, she used to go to the local flying club with her father.Her parents started noticing her interest.But when she grew up,her father and her professors and teachersadvised her not to pursue this profession.There was nothing for girls in this career path.Sanjay Chawla says thatit was a big shock for everyone.Everyone tried to discourage her,asking her not to do it.But no one could stop Kalpana.From Punjab Engineering College,she completed her Bachelor's degree in Aeronautical Engineering.And then she went to America to complete her Master's degreeat University of Texas.Even though her father was disapprovingof her decision to go abroad to study."Because I lived in India, in a very small town,and, um, forget about space,I didn't even know if my folks weregoing to let me go to the engineering college."Later in 1988,she did her PhD in Aerospace Engineeringfrom the University of Colorado.She was 26 years old at the timewhen she started working at NASA's Ames Research Center.Her specialization was Fluid Dynamics Aircraft.That is, studying howthe air flows like fluid around an aircraft's wings and all around.She had several pilot licenses.She knew how to fly airplanes, gliders, and seaplanes.In 1991, she became an American citizen.And in 1994, NASA selected 20 out of 4,000 applicants for astronaut training.One of whom was Kalpana Chawla.After 3 years of training, in November 1997Kalpana went on her first flight into space.The Columbia program flight STS-87.In this space shuttle, she orbits the Earth more than 250 times.She stayed in space for 2 weeks.STS's full form was Space Transportation System.This was the official name of NASA's space shuttle program.This was the 4th programthat had human-space flights.The first was Project Mercury,then Project Gemini,and then the most famous Apollo program,and then this program, which started in 1981.This was the longest human space flight program in history,which ran till 2011.Here, NASA's focus was on re-usability.To launch the same space shuttle again and again.So that there was no need to build new space shuttles every time.There were two main space shuttles used in this program.The first was the Challengerand the second was the Columbia Space Shuttle.After the Columbia disaster,Discovery, Atlantis, and Endeavor space shuttles were also used.You can find these in museums today.Among all of them, the Columbia was the first space shuttleto go into space in April 1981.It had completed 27 successful missions before the disaster.Now you might be thinking,was it safe to use a shuttle so many times?Was this the reason behind this disaster?The answer is No.The STS program was designed specifically for reusability.After every flight, there was a long processof inspecting, repairing, and refurbishing the shuttles.The actual reason behind the Columbia disasterwas a minor reason.We will discuss this later in the video.But as a concept, there was nothing wrong with the STS program.The 24th flight of the Columbia Space Shuttlewas Kalpana Chawla's first space flight.STS-87In it, she was the Mission Specialist.She was the main operator of the robotic arm of the flight.Her job was to operate a robot arm in this flightthat would deploy the Spartan satellite.A satellite that would be sent to study the outer layer of the sun.But during this mission, something happensthat shakes her confidence.This 1,360 kg satellitegoes out of controland she was unable to retrieve it.After 3 days and a spacewalkthe satellite had to be brought back.But later, NASA scientists congratulated herand praised her.She told the University of Texas magazine,"K.C., you did a great job."Many senior astronauts had told her this.It turned out that it wasn't her faultbut someone else's in the shuttle crew.Because of this successful mission,Kalpana became the first Indian-origin womanto go to spaceand the first South Asian-American woman.The then Indian Prime Minister Inder Kumar Gujralhad congratulated her."Yes, Mr Gujral,I hear you loud and clear.How do you read me?""Kalpana, we are proud of you.Each one of us.You have done such pioneering work.""Thank you, sir, thank you very much."And how Kalpana was feeling when she went to space for the first time?She had this to say."When you look at the stars and galaxy,you feel that you are not just from any particular piece of land,but from the solar system."That is, before a city, a country or a continent,we humans belong to the Earth and the solar system as a whole.This flight lasted for 16 daysand ran many other scientific experiments too.Like, it was observed how plant reproduction works in microgravity.But more interesting were the experimentsthat were done on her second and last flight before the crash.16th January 2003, 10.29 AM,Columbia Space Shuttle leaves the Earth for the last time.This mission was originally planned for 2001and it was delayed 13 times.Finally, in 2003,it was launched from Kennedy Space Center.Mission STS-107had 7 astronauts in total, led by Commander Rick Husband.The Payload Commander was Michael Andersonand three Mission Specialistsone of whom was Kalpana Chawla.The Pilots were William McCooland from the Israel Space Agency, was Ilan Ramon, who was a Payload Specialist.The mission of these astronauts wasto conduct non-stop experiments for 24 hours.Non-stop didn't mean without sleeping.It meant working in shifts, obviously.For 16 days, when they were in space,they carried out around 80 experimentsin life sciences, material science, and fluid physics.Kalpana Chawla was focusing on microgravity.How combustion happens in space.How fire can be suppressed.How crystal growth happens.And even how prostate cancer grows in space.Without going into too much detail,this was quite interesting becausewhen cells grow in laboratories on Earth,they grow in two-dimensional mono-layers in culture dishes.But in space, cells grow in three dimensionsin the shape of spheroids.Similarly, cancer tumours are formed in our bodies.This helped us understand tumour behaviour.In this mission, a company called Spacehab collaborated with NASAwith the help of which, universities, companies, and government agencies all over the world,could conduct their research in spacewithout going to space themselves.It meant that these astronauts were doing experiments on their behalf.In fact, children from 6 schools in Australia, China, Israel, Japan, the USA,were chosen who wanted to have these astronauts run their experiments.Spiders, silkworms, organic crystals,fishes, bees, ants,how do they react in space?Children wanted to know theseso experiments were being conducted on it.An interesting thing about flowers was discovered in these experimentsthe smell of these flowers on the Earthchanges in space.Because even during the mission,the data was constantly being transmitted to Earthapproximately 30% of the data from these experimentswas saved, collected, and kept in the ground stations.Some videos of the successful experiments were recordedwhich were then sent back to the childrenlike the ones about ants and crystals.However, there were more than 40 experimentsHowever, an interesting thing here is thatthere was a live group of roundwormswhich survived this disasterwith minor heat damagebecause they were kept in aluminium canisters.After the disaster, the broken pieces of the spaceship were recovered.Among them were 5-6 cansin whose Petri dishes these roundworms were still alive.The missions later onlike in 2011, the second last mission of the STS program, Space Shuttle Endeavour,some descendants of these roundworms were sent on that mission.But now let's come to the biggest question of this video.What was the reason behind this incident?Did the pilot make a mistake?Or did some other crew member make some hasty decisions?Was it the fault of an astronaut?The truth is that these were not the reason.None of the 7 astronauts in Colombia made any mistake.And even 3-4 minutes before the accident,none of them had any idea about what was going to happen.Watch this video recording.This is from a few minutes before the accident.The astronauts were laughing and joking.Kalpana Chawla is also saying something.It was only at 8:58 AMthat the astronauts got an indicationthat everything was not going as it should be.Columbia's backup flight software showed some messages on the displayto let them know that four wheels on the left side of the space shuttlehas lost pressure.And this warning came exactly one minute beforethe time when Columbia lost the signal to the Earth.The CAPCOM on the groundwas trying to communicate about this.Now how would it feel if I said thatalthough the astronauts had no information about thissome people in NASA knew about this problem.Not just a couple of hours before the accidentbut 16 days before.They knew this when the shuttle was launched.The thing is that after 81 seconds of Columbia's launcha small piece of foam separated from the shuttle and collided with the left wing.This foam was used to connect Columbia's external tank to the main shuttle.It was not a big piece.It was only 60 cm long and 40 cm wide.It weighed only 750 grams.But it hit the left wing with so much velocitythat the velocity is estimated to have beenbetween 700-900 km per hour.2-3 days after this incident,some NASA engineers asked STS Program Manager Ron D. Dittemoreto take pictures to examine the damagethat was caused to the space shuttle.They could have used their American spy satellites.But the engineers said that the Chief refused this request.This is why when this was later found out after the incident,in April 2003, he resigned from his position.Acknowledging his mistake.In 2008, the book by space journalists Michael Cabbage and William Hardwood,Comm Check stated thatthe Department of Defense was ready to use its spy camerasbut the officials refused.An internal commission was formed to investigate thiswhich was named the Columbia Accident Investigation Board.In short, CAIB.In August 2003, this commission released a thorough reportin which it was explained in detailwhy this Columbia disaster happenedand what caused it.This report mentioned NASA's negligence again.NASA's human spaceflight chief William Readdy's failureto accept this offer ofusing spy satellites to monitor the damage to the shuttle.This is why the damage was not investigatedand this mission went on as planned for the next 15 days.Until 1st February, when the mission was over,and the space shuttle had to return to Earth.The damage on the left wing of the space shuttlecaused a small hole.As it descended into Earth's atmosphere,the damage became even bigger.Because of the small hole, air began to leakand normally there is a thermal protection systemthat maintains the temperature inside the space shuttle.But due to the air leak, the hole became largerand as soon as it happened,a piece of insulation as big as a suitcase broke.A significant portion of Columbia was now exposed to external fire and gases.Because of this, the sensors in the left wing stopped working first.The temperature readings weren't available.Then the tire pressure readings disappeared.And just like that,the spacecraft started to break apart into pieces.The people on the ground capture this videoin which bright flashes are seen.A small piece of foam, caused this incidentand 7 people lost their lives.However, it is important to mention thatthe report of CAIB in 2003stated that such foam strikes happen regularly during space shuttle launches.The photos from the launch of 79 missions that were availableshowed that such foam strikes had been seen in 65 missions before.Such foam strikes were very common.But the problematic part about this foam strike was thatthis piece hit the wrong place at the wrong time.5 years after the incident, another report was published in December 2008.Columbia Crew Survival Investigation Report.This showed that due to the disruption of cabin pressure,the astronauts passed away within a few seconds.When the Columbia Space Shuttle was disintegrating violently,they did not have to suffer any heat or damage.This report tried to reconstruct the crew's last minutes.What happened in those last minutes?Warning signs and alerts were ringing all around.There were problems with tire pressure and landing gear.This report also stated thateven if the cabin had better equipment,the astronauts could not have been saved."The breakup of the crew module andthe crew's subsequent exposure to hypersonic entry conditionswas not survivable by any currently existing capability."After this incident, NASA stopped this space shuttle program for 2.5 years.And most importantly,the design of the foam ramp was also changed.The design was changed so thatan incident like this would not happen again.And thankfully, till now, even 20 years later,such an incident was not repeated.The space shutter program was continued untilthe International Space Station was functional.In July 2011, when it was finally wrapped up,135 missions were carried out under this programand it had run for 30 years.In these 30 years, 14 astronauts lost their lives in unfortunate accidents.And one of them was Kalpana Chawla.India lost its pride.But Kalpana Chawla's impact is seen in the lives of millions, directly or indirectly.Kalpana was so passionate about science educationthat she wanted every girl in India to get such an education.This is why she convinced NASA thatat her secondary school in Karnal,Tagore Bal Niketan Senior Secondary School,the students from there could participate in NASA's Summer Space Experience Program.Since 1998, every year,this school sent two girls to Houston, America,for the Foundation for International Space Education's United Space School.And Kalpana Chawla used to invite these girls to her home for dinner.NASA paid tributes to Kalpana Chawla and other crew members in the last few years.Like NASA's landing on Mars,that place was called Columbia Memorial Station.And there are many asteroids between Mars and Jupiterthat were named after these crew members.This is why, today, somewhere far away in our solar systeman asteroid is orbiting the Sun,whose name is 51826 Kalpana Chawla.If you liked this video, you will also like this one,there is a video on another such incident,where the astronauts actually survived,after being lost in space for weeks.The Apollo 13 mission.You can click here to watch it.Thank you very much!