With the evidence collected so far failing to point to any obvious cause, the investigation of the Columbia disaster is turning into a long and slow process.
The independent accident investigation board, chaired by retired Admiral Harold Gehman, arrived at the NASA鈥檚 Johnson Space Flight Center on Thursday, to start taking over the probe into the disaster.
Tracking down what went wrong on Columbia now requires systematically going through a 鈥渇ault tree鈥� containing thousands of entries, said space shuttle program manager Ron Dittemore. Then he added: 鈥淚t is with some relief that I welcome Admiral Gehman.鈥�
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Some critics have complained the panel is packed with government insiders, lacking an outsider like the eminent physicist Richard Feynman who served on the Challenger accident panel. But the panel now wants to add members without NASA ties.
Inboard edge
The panel faces an arduous task. Reports that Columbia had started shedding debris over California had raised hopes of finding vital clues to the cause of the disintegration over Texas. But Dittemore said NASA had so far failed to verify that any of the material collected west of Texas came from the shuttle.
Engineers will need time to analyse eyewitness accounts, photos, videos and other data. For example, according to Aviation Week and Space Technology, high-resolution images taken from a ground-based Air Force tracking camera shows 鈥渟erious structural damage to the inboard leading edge of Columbia鈥檚 left wing鈥� about a minute before it was destroyed.
Unfortunately, said Dittemore, NASA had also received some information that was 鈥渘ot accurate鈥�, i.e. faked.