Tribute

The Crew of the Columbia: STS-107

STS-107 crew; in front are (left to right) Payload Specialist Ilan Ramon, Pilot William "Willie" McCool and Mission Specialist David Brown. Standing in back are (left to right) Payload Commander Michael Anderson, Mission Specialist Kalpana Chawla, Commander Rick Husband and Mission Specialist Laurel Clark

STS-107 crew; in front are (left to right) Payload Specialist Ilan Ramon, Pilot William “Willie” McCool and Mission Specialist David Brown. Standing in back are (left to right) Payload Commander Michael Anderson, Mission Specialist Kalpana Chawla, Commander Rick Husband and Mission Specialist Laurel Clark

8:44:09am, February 1, 2003.  The Space Shuttle Columbia encounters the atmosphere after a short reentry burn.

Four minutes later, sensors show strains on the leading edge of Columbia’s left wing were higher than those recorded on previous reentries.

8:53:46am observers on the ground noted debris being shed as Columbia traveled at Mach 22.8.

8:59:32am The last transmission from the crew of the Columbia is received.

9:00:53am The main cabin was completely depressurized.  4 seconds later the crew cabin was seen disintegrating from the ground.  The crew could not have survived any later than this point.

A few months earlier, a photo shows the crew posing together during a Terminal Countdown Demonstration (a simulation of the final hours of a launch countdown that serves as a practice exercise in which both the launch team and flight crew rehearse launch day timelines and procedures).

Kneeling in front are (left to right) Payload Specialist Ilan Ramon (the first Israeli astronaut), Pilot William “Willie” McCool and Mission Specialist David Brown. Standing in back are (left to right) Payload Commander Michael Anderson, Mission Specialist Kalpana Chawla, Commander Rick Husband and Mission Specialist Laurel Clark.

The original image (seen here) comes from the Kennedy Space Center Media archive.  As in my other edits of the Apollo 1 crew and the crew of the Challenger, the image was edited as a tribute to the memory of the crew and as a thank you for their service.

Godspeed and thank you STS-107.  You are not forgotten.

The wikipedia entry here was used as the source for this blog.

The Crew of the Challenger: STS-51L

Ali_Elhajj_GPN-2000-001868

Left to Right: Mission Specialist, Ronald McNair, Payload Specialist, Gregory Jarvis, Teacher in Space Participant, Christa McAuliffe. Directly behind them: Mission Specialist Judy Resnik and Mission Specialist, Ellison Onizuka.

January and Early February are a somber time for NASA.  The Apollo 1 fire occurred on January 27th, the Challenger was lost on January 28th, and the Columbia on February 1st.  I can’t imagine this time of the year for the those at NASA who worked with the astronauts lost furthering our knowledge of ourselves and the cosmos.

Two years ago, with this on my mind, I created a tribute to the crew of Apollo 1 – some part of me wanted to say “we remember you”.  My hope was to bring the crews, their memories, and their images into today.  This year, I decided to do the same for the Challenger and Columbia’s crews.

I try to find behind-the-scenes images of the crews and do not normally choose press photos.  Unfortunately, finding source images, especially those of good quality which communicate the crew members’ personalities, is not always easy.  Once I have the image(s), I take them into Photoshop and Lightroom for noise reduction, sharpening, tonal changes, and cropping.  I also add my own small, but restrained, artistic touch to the source material(s).

For the Challenger crew, I started with the first image above taken during an emergency egress exercise 20 days prior to launch. The image resonated with me, but the original was quite poor and it did not show the full crew.  I couldn’t, in good conscience, publish it alone.  I very much wanted the whole crew to be represented, hence the second image.  While it is a press photo, I do feel the personalities of the crew come across.

Ali_Elhajj_STS-51L

From the back row, left to right: Mission Specialist, Ellison S. Onizuka, Teacher in Space Participant Sharon Christa McAuliffe, Payload Specialist, Greg Jarvis and Mission Specialist, Judy Resnik. In the front row from left to right: Pilot Mike Smith, Commander, Dick Scobee and Mission Specialist, Ron McNair.

The before/unedited images Courtesy of NASA.

Ali_Elhajj_GPN-2000-001868
Ali_Elhajj_STS-51L Crew