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 Summary

Photography by Robert McCullough, with The Dallas Morning News, capturing the reentry and disintegration of Space Shuttle Columbia on February 1, 2003.

 Biographical / Historical

The Space Shuttle Columbia disintegrated upon reentry on February 1, 2003 due to a failure in the shuttle's heat-resistant tiles, which were damaged during its launch. As the shuttle reentered Earth's atmosphere, the compromised tiles allowed intense heat to penetrate the spacecraft, leading to its breakup over Texas. The loss of Columbia and its seven crew members highlighted the critical importance of safety measures and thorough risk assessment in space missions, prompting NASA to undertake extensive changes in shuttle design, inspection procedures, and safety protocols to prevent such a disaster from happening again.

 Identifier

NASM.2004.0029

Creator

McCullough, Robert L.

Date

bulk 2003

Provenance

Robert L. McCullough, Gift, 2004, NASM.2004.0029.

Extent

2.062 Gigabytes ((17 digital images))

Archival Repository

National Air and Space Museum Archives

Scope and Contents

This collection contains 17 digital images showing the disintegration of the Space Shuttle Columbia upon its reentry on February 1, 2003. These images were shot by the donor, Robert McCullough, with his Canon EOS Elan 7E with a Canon 75-300mm Image Stabilizer Zoom set at 300mm and a 2x converter (600mm, 12x). McCullough held the camera in hand due to the speed of its traverse, and some images exhibit these camera movements. Prints on FujiChrome Provia 400F were made of the focused images and included in the donation as two sets of ten prints. The second set of these ten images are the original full frame images while the first set are duplicates enlarged to show details. The copyright for the images is held by The Dallas Morning News.

Arrangement note

Photos are in orginial order, which is chronological.

Rights

Material is subject to Smithsonian Terms of Use. Should you wish to use NASM material in any medium, please submit an Application for Permission to Reproduce NASM Material, available at Permissions Requests

Restrictions

No restrictions on access.

Citation

Space Shuttle Columbia Reentry Imagery, NASM.2004.0029, National Air and Space Museum, Smithsonian Institution.

Topics

Space shuttles

Astronautics

Space flight

Space Shuttles, Columbia (OV-102)

Type

Collection descriptions

Archival materials

Gigabytes

Cd-roms

Digital images

Photographs