Columbia
Aziz P
5 years ago today.
Here's what I wrote back then, the very morning. I've got a memoriam post up at Haibane with some other images and links.
In addition to the American members of the crew, it should also be noted that two other astronauts, one from India and the other from Israel, also perished aboard Columbia. The Indian astronaut was Kalpana Chawla, India's first female in space. Wikipedia notes that kalpana in Sanskrit means "imagination of the mind" and thus also "creation". The Israeli astronaut was Col. Ilan Ramon, a combat pilot in the Israeli Air Force, and the first Israeli astronaut. But not the last, inshallah.
I continue to think of that tragedy as still more reason to scrap the shuttle project and move on, but that doesn't lessen the sacrifices of those brave souls, or the truth of what you wrote.
We weren't in the debris area, but one of our local professors led the GIS aspect of the debris search. I went to a talk given by him, and he said that the various teams doing searches, even the Coast Guard, didn't know their GPSs very well, and they were reporting their coordinates in different formats, which temporarily messed up the data . He also served as an interpreter for the D.C. people who had trouble understanding Deep East Texas-dialect.
The professor's main point was that everyone should understand map formats and datums, because you just never know when you might have to help out after a space ship (or other disaster) falls on your town.
Once you all spoke our names with pride;
cried “Godspeed!” as we screamed into the sky
on twin pillars of roaring bright dragonfyre.
You punched bunched fists into the air as
we speared through Florida’s tattered cloud,
the crackling of our engines loud enough
to make you gasp in pain. You watched us
fly and pierce the sky again and again and again…
Now you mock us, call us “foolish”,
say we were mistakes that should never
have been made; betray us on your Blogs,
kick us like dogs, turn your backs on
all we have achieved and, with perverse glee,
some even watch half-hoping that we
fail to reach the Dark so they can crow
“See? Another one gone! I told you so!”
How soon you forget; how soon you’ll
regret our passing when you see
what takes our place. When Orion finally flies -
that flat-assed capsule on its rocket pencil-thin -
you’ll stop and think “How wrong, how small
it looks.” When Ares eventually reaches out
for the blue you’ll stare into the NewSpace-
conquered sky, remembering how fine we were:
sleek as swans and blizzard white; sunlight
flashing off our wide wings, engines singing
with delight, leaving Earth far, far behind…
You’ll fall back on fond memories of com-sats
repaired and spared early orbital graves;
the golden arrays of a good-as-new Hubble,
bathed in sunlight as night turned to day;
seven-hour space-walks by grinning space
voyagers, grappling with struts, nuts and
bolts, their sausage-fat fingers clinging
to spanners and tools, laughing like fools
as Earth turned in silence below, and you’ll know
when you see that first Ares fly
that our lives were triumphs, not mistakes,
and staring into the sky, sighing at those red and white
parachutes flapping and slapping in the wind
you’ll shake your heads sadly and gladly swap the sight
of Orions falling back to Earth with a splash
for that beautiful double-tap crack of Atlantis
heading for home…
True, our time may be passing, our Age may be through
but you’ll miss us when we are gone.
No more orbital ballet, RCS pirouetting,
no more space-walkers waving “Hi Mom!”
No more look at that! pictures of tiled wings reflecting
Earth’s sapphire blue oceans and skies;
only memories of launches and Welcome Home landings
that brought tears to a weary world’s eyes.
© Stuart Atkinson 2007 The 'Verse
Of course we all lose our tempers now and then. Dean freely admits to being imperfect in this regard, which is why regulars to this establishment will generally be cut more slack than people who we don't know very well.
Still: behave like an adult, or go find somewhere else to play. Thanks.