Michael Leinbach: Bringing Columbia Home: The Untold Story of a Lost Space Shuttle and Her Crew

Stacy Faison, “Shuttle Crew Visits East Texas,” Lufkin Daily News , April 11, 2003.

NASA, “Columbia Recovery Agenda for Family Visit,” internal memo, April 23, 2003.

Interview with Brent Jett.

US Navy, Salvage Report , 5-2.

Cohrs, “Notes,” 19.

NASA, Report CB-QMS-024 , 9.

USDA Forest Service, “Fire and Aviation Management Briefing Paper, Columbia Support, Interagency Support to Space Shuttle Columbia Recovery Effort,” USDA Forest Service, Washington, DC, May 2, 2003.

Jan Amen email, April 30, 2003.

“Columbia Shuttle Recovery Appreciation Program” (Lufkin, TX: April 29, 2003), program agenda.

Interview with Boo Walker.

US Navy, Salvage Report , 5–6, B-1.

FEMA, “Recap of the Search for Columbia Shuttle Material,” news release 3171-EM NR071, May 5, 2003.

Mark Stanford, “STS-107 Space Shuttle Columbia Recovery Operation, February 1–May 10, 2003,” PowerPoint presentation (undated); David King and Scott “Doc” Horowitz, “Space Shuttle Columbia Recovery Operation,” (Washington, DC: March 8, 2013), presentation to Space Policy Institute Symposium. https://www.c-span.org/video/?311395-3/space-shuttle-columbia-recovery-operation.

Interview with Steve Altemus.

Interview with Steve Altemus.

NASA, untitled video on lessons learned in Columbia reconstruction with Steve Altemus and Pam Melroy, July 2003 (unreleased).

Pam Melroy, NASA reconstruction video.

Michelle La Vone, “The Space Shuttle Challenger Disaster,” Space Safety Magazine , January 28, 2016, www.spacesafetymagazine.com/space-disasters/challenger-disaster/.

Robert Pearlman, “Smithsonian Considering Display of Fallen Shuttles Challenger and Columbia Debris,” collectSPACE.com , January 31, 2011, www.collectspace.com/news/news-013111a.html.

Interview with John Biegert.

Interview with Jim Comer.

Interviews with Jim Comer and Jon Cowart.

Pam Melroy, in NASA reconstruction video.

“Schirra, Lovell Cheer KSC Workers,” Spaceport News , March 21, 2003, 7.

Interview with Pat Adkins.

Interview with Jim Comer.

Interviews with Steve Altemus and Pam Melroy.

“Panel Confident of Finding Cause,” Florida Today , March 19, 2003, 2A.

NASA, Columbia Accident Investigation Board Report, Vol. 1 (Washington, DC, August 2003), 75.

Interview with Marty McLellan.

Shafer and LeConey. “Legal Issues,” 56–7.

“Student Science Project Survived Shuttle Disaster,” CNN, May 24, 2003. Quoted in Liston, Chronology of KSC for 2003 , 111.

NASA reconstruction video.

CAIB Report , 75.

CAIB Report , 76.

CAIB Report , 75.

NASA reconstruction video.

Sean O’Keefe email to Mike Leinbach and Jonathan Ward.

Interviews with Ann Micklos, Pam Melroy, and John Biegert. Biegert said that many of the digital timers used by the crew survived reentry and were recovered in working order, although their displays were fogged over.

Interview with Jim Wetherbee.

Jeff Williams, interviewed by Connie Hodges.

CAIB Report , 61.

Jim Comer noted that Enterprise was at the time being prepared for exhibit in the Udvar-Hazy Center of the Smithsonian’s National Air and Space Museum. Pam Melroy and Comer traveled to Washington and negotiated with museum director Gen. J. R. “Jack” Dailey for a loan of the leading edge panels and the landing gear door. As a side note, Enterprise did not have thermal tiles, since it was not intended to fly in space. NASA glued tiles to Enterprise ’s landing gear door to simulate an operational shuttle for these tests.

Interview with Steve Altemus.

Interview with Robert Hanley.

“Debris Reconstruction Hangar Walk-through Days Scheduled,” Spaceport News , June 27, 2003, 2.

“Texas Family Recalls Recovery Contributions,” Spaceport News , September 5, 2003, 4.

Robert Pearlman, “Smithsonian Considering Display.”

Interview with Mike Ciannilli.

Interview with Scott Thurston.

“Storage of Columbia Debris to be Determined,” Spaceport News , July 11, 2003, 2.

Interview with Scott Thurston.

“Columbia Tank Found on Lakebed,” NASA online article, August 3, 2011, https://www.nasa.gov/mission_pages/shuttle/main/columbiatankfound.html.

“Columbia Debris Finds Final Home in VAB,” Spaceport News , October 31, 2003, 2.

“VAB 16th Floor A Tower Is Columbia’s Arlington,” Spaceport News , February 13, 2004, 5.

STS-121 mission summary, https://www.nasa.gov/mission_pages/shuttle/shuttlemissions/archives/sts-121.html.

Interviews with Mike Leinbach and Mike Ciannilli.

Interviews with Jim Comer and Steve Altemus.

NASA, Crew Survival Investigation Report , 4–5.

Pam Melroy email to Jonathan Ward; NASA, Crew Survival Investigation Report 3-69–3-70.

NASA, “Expedition 6 Crew Returns Home,” May 3, 2003, https://www.nasa.gov/missions/shuttle/soyuz_landing_update.html.

Jim Banke, “NASA’s O’Keefe Promises Study of Safety Reporting System,” Space.com, May 22, 2003, quoted in Liston, KSC Chronology of KSC for 2003 , 109–10.

CAIB Report , 118.

“Inquiry costs taxpayers $454 million,” Florida Today , August 26, 2003, 1A, 5A.

Wayne Hale notes to Mike Leinbach.

Hubble orbits at 28.5° inclination and 335 miles altitude; the ISS orbit is 51° inclination and 250 miles altitude.