Conference 7.286::space

Associated Press Tue 04-FEB-1986 19:51                          Space Shuttle

                  Searchers Apparently Find a Booster
                         By HARRY F. ROSENTHAL
                        Associated Press Writer
   CAPE CANAVERAL, Fla. (AP) - Searchers apparently located one of
Challenger's two rocket boosters Tuesday and NASA said that could
prove ``a very valuable piece of evidence'' in the investigation of
the space shuttle's explosion.
   ``Sonar soundings indicate a solid rocket booster may have been
located,'' a NASA statement said. There was no information on the
precise location.
   There also was no indication whether it was Challenger's right
booster - the chief suspect in the liftoff explosion that destroyed
the shuttle and killed its seven astronauts Jan. 28. Challenger had
two such boosters to help propel it into space.
   ``It would be a miracle if we could find the right hand segment
we saw in the pictures and everybody has a hypothesis about,'' said
Jim Mizell, a space agency spokesman. ``There are many things you
could tell engineering-wise if you recovered that data.''
   CBS, meanwhile, reported that ``at least a portion'' of the
shuttle's main crew compartment has been located and that some of
the personal effects of the astronauts floated to the ocean
surface. NBC said some of the human remains brought to shore in
recent days have been identified as belonging to the seven
astronauts.
   NASA spokesman Richard Young, adhering to a self-imposed agency
rule, said ``We don't have any word from the investigation board
about that.''
   If the booster is the from the right side ``we have a very
valuable piece of evidence for the (accident) review board,''
Mizell said.
   When the shuttle blew up, the two boosters separated and began
flying crazily in the sky. When one of them appeared to be headed
toward the Florida coast, a range safety officer sent a radio
signal that detonated an explosive charge and blew the top off both
boosters.
   That had the effect of shooting flame out both ends, stopping
the forward motion and tumbling the rocket into the sea. Under such
circumstances, the casing could have survived almost intact. NASA
was expected to summon a salvage ship with heavy-lift capacity, if
the sonar indications were correct.
   Recovery of the booster might show whether a leak in the thick
metal casing caused a tongue of flame to heat the huge external
tank, setting off the blast. This flame was seen in film, although
its origin was not clear.
   Engineers could gain much knowledge just studying the burn
patterns or the joints on the side of the thick rocket casing,
Mizell said.
   ``We don't have to find the whole booster to have valuable
evidence,'' Miozell said. ``We just have to find the right
motors.'' He explained that each of the rocket's four segments is a
motor.
   The announcement of the possible discovery came hours after NASA
severely cut back a search of the surface, which has yielded only
one-tenth of Challenger's wreckage and shifted emphasis to the
``relatively slow and arduous search of the ocean bottom.''
   Chief objects of the search besides the right booster are the
crew compartment, with its cockpit voice recorder and electronics
that monitor and record spacecraft systems.
   Two National Aeronautics and Space Administration ships with
sonar and robot submarines that can see ``hundreds of times better
than the human eye'' continued scanning the bottom of the Atlantic
Ocean 40 miles offshore in water 1,100 feet deep.
   With any surface debris scattered ever wider by strong ocean
currents, the Navy pulled out its ships, leaving only four Coast
Guard vessels, four fixed wing planes and two helicopters. There
had been 10 aircraft and 15 ships on Monday.
   ``I wouldn't be surprised if tomorrow nobody's there,'' said Lt.
Cmdr. James Simpson of the Coast Guard. The helicopters were
patrolling the coast 12 miles offshore, from New Smyrna Beach,
Fla., to Charleston, S.C.
   NASA on Tuesday crossed off seven of 17 ``targets'' - objects
seen in sonar soundings - after a closer look by robot submarines
showed they were not parts from the shuttle.
   The agency also admitted it was in error Monday when it said two
interesting soundings were old wreckage of a helicopter and an
airplane. There were no sonar soundings at all, spokeswoman Sarah
Keegan said Tuesday.
   ``They were evidently surveillance craft flying through the
area,'' Ms. Keegan said. ``So they were in the air, not under
water. They were radar sightings, not sonar soundings.''
   Simpson said 12 tons of floating debris had been retrieved and
taken to a hangar at the Kennedy Space Center where it is being
examined. That's only one-tenth of the 123-ton weight of the
shuttle and its cargo, which included a $100 million communications
satellite that is the largest made for civilian use.
   Members of an interim investigation board were flying to
Washington to make their first report to the presidential panel
that is charged with finding out ``how it happened and how it can
be prevented from happening again.''
   The commission holds its first meeting on Thursday. NASA
spokesman Hugh Harris said the interim board members would release
no information until they had met with the commission.
   ``NASA's interim mishap investigation board will continue to be
functional and be the technical inquiry team,'' Harris said. He
added that the space agency is pleased with the creation of the
commission and is looking forward to working with it.
   The group is charged with making its report within 120 days.
   In Washington, meanwhile, key House leaders decided to delay any
hearings into the accident until the new commission has time to
reach at least tentative findings.
   ``We're not going to do a separate investigation,'' said Rep.
Harold Volkmer, D-Mo., after meeting with several other key members
of the House Science and Technology Committee.
   At the Kennedy Space Center, flags remained at half-staff one
week after the worst tragedy in the U.S. space program.
   Although launches are declared suspended until the cause of the
accident is determined and corrections are made, some work was
being performed on the remaining three shuttles in the fleet.
   The thermal tiles on Atlantis and Columbia were being
waterproofed, engineers were checking Columbia's hydraulic systems
and Discovery was being readied for eventual transport to
Vandenberg AFB in California where a new Air Force shuttle launch
pad is being completed.

Associated Press Wed 05-FEB-1986 18:39                       Shuttle-Boosters

   Low Temperatures Could Have Been Factor In Challenger Explosion
                             By PAUL RECER
                          AP Aerospace Writer
   SPACE CENTER, Houston (AP) - Freezing temperatures and the
vibrations of launch could have combined to cause a solid rocket
booster to crack and trigger the explosion that blew apart
Challenger, rocketry experts said Wednesday.
   Gary Flandro of Georgia Institute of Technology and Herman Krier
of the University of Illinois, both experts on solid-fueled
rocketry, said the overnight subfreezing temperatures at the
Kennedy Space Center just before launch could have caused
temperature differences of 50 degrees or more between the inside
and the outside of Challenger's two solid rocket engines.
   Such a wide range of temperatures, they said, could have worked
with the stress of vibration to cause a failure in the rocket wall.
   Photos taken after the launch show a jet of flame roaring out of
side of Challenger's right solid rocket booster. Some experts
believe this flame caused a fuel tank to explode.
   There were no temperature sensors in the solid rocket boosters,
an omission that Flandro called ``imprudent.''
   ``Any kind of material like this (solid rocket propellant) is
temperature sensitive,'' said Flandro. ``Temperature extremes have
always been a problem in military rockets and that's why the
military stores them at controlled temperatues.''
   Temperatures dropped below freezing at the Kennedy Space Center
on the night of Jan. 27, and when launch day dawned there were
icicles on the pad. NASA and the Air Force refuse to release
readings from the space center area for launch day, but other
sources say the temperatures dropped to a low of 24 degrees during
the night and were only at 38 degrees at launch time.
   An executive at Morton Thiokol Inc., manufacturer of the solid
rocket engines said the rockets are designed to operate when the
average temperature of the propellant is 40 degrees. He said each
1.2 million-pound rocket is so large that it would take a
month-long soak in low temperatures for the bulk temperature to
reach 40 degrees.
   ``I'm not saying that temperature couldn't have had some
effect,'' said the executive, who asked not to be identified. He
noted, however, that there was no reason to believe that the
temperatures of the boosters were too low for a safe launch. He
admitted that there were no temperature sensors in the Challenger
solid rocket engines, however.
   But Flandro said the atmospheric temperature, teamed with other
factors, could have been been an important contributor to the
explosion.
   ``Temperature differences are really critical for a solid rocket
booster when mixed with the amount of stress applied durig
launch,'' he said.
   He said the rocket engines during previous launches have
recorded instances of more vibration than expected, and this could
have happened last week.
   ``So we would have a system already stressed with cold
temperatures, and then you add vibrations that could have been
worse than usual, then you would have a chance of failure,'' he
said.
   The walls of the boosters are half-inch-thick steel lined with
an asbestos-silica cloth. The engine is made in four sections and
shipped to the Kennedy Space Center where workers join the sections
with heavy steel pins.
   An overpressure would be most apt to blow through one of these
seams which are called ``field joints,'' and Flandro said a flaw in
a joint could have been a factor in the explosion.
   The individual factors taken alone, said Flandro, may not have
caused a problem with the rocket engines, but taken together they
could have been deadly.
   ``A combination of small factors like this could have led to a
disaster,'' he said.
   He said the shuttle rockets are basically sound and have shown
themselves to be ``very stout and robust'' under normal conditions.
But Flandro said NASA has never conducted a large number of tests
in temperature extremes with a variety of vibrational effects.
   ``It is a very robust design,'' he said, ``but there is a lot of
chance behavior in a solid rocket, a lot of variability. They never
act the same each time.''
   Five static tests were conducted with the rocket engines, said
Flandro, but this would not be considered enough from a statistical
point of view to assure absolute safety.
   Krier said the fact that only one of Challenger's rockets failed
showed that the problem was not caused by any single factor, such
as temperature. If only one element was involved, he said, then
both rockets should have failed.
   He said cold temperatures could have caused a few centimeters of
the propellant to crack. Vibrations could have enlarged the cracks,
causing the propellant to start burning at an unplanned location,
in effect burning more propellant per second than planned.
   This, in turn, said Krier, could cause ``a high internal
pressure that could blow out a wall.''
   This same scenario could have occurred if there was an extreme
temperature variation from one side of the propellant to the other,
he said.
   ``The outer portions would be colder,'' he said. ``When you get
a plate cold on one side and not on the other, then it could crack.
Engineers have worried about that in solid rockets for many years.''
   But if temperature was the only source of the problem, said
Krier, ``the question is why did only one fail? It probably was a
combination of things,'' but low temperatures could have been a
major part of the problem.
   Both men emphasized that it will take months of careful analysis
to determine what caused Challenger to explode, and they said there
may be a need for more solid rocket engine testing.
   ``No one should jump to a conclusion of any sort until all of
the data is known,'' said Krier.

Associated Press Fri 07-FEB-1986 12:43                          Space Shuttle

                         Shuttle-Investigation
                         By HARRY F. ROSENTHAL
                        Associated Press Writer
   CAPE CANAVERAL, Fla. (AP) - The Coast Guard said today it is
abandoning its search for floating debris from space shuttle
Challenger and will concentrate on recovering objects from the
bottom of the Atlantic.
   The sea sweep, which has produced 12 tons of debris, including
large pieces of fuselage and wing sections, a rocket booster nose
cone and the top of the shuttle's fuel tank, has been going on
since Challenger exploded 10 days ago.
   Coast Guard cutters have crisscrossed thousands of square miles
of ocean from Melbourne, Fla., to the sea off the North Carolina
coast and eastward for 90 miles and more.
   But the surface sweep has produced less and less in recent days
and the Coast Guard announced ``the active search for floating
debris will be suspended tonight. Future operations will
concentrate on underwater recovery.''
   Word of the search abandonment came as government officials held
a series of pep talks with employees of this vast launch center,
pledging that the space program will go on, stronger than ever,
after the cause of the explosion is found.
   ``We'll fix it and go on,'' Rep. Bill Nelson, D-Fla., who flew
on a shuttle mission earlier this year, said at the first of four
meetings with NASA and contractor employees.
   ``We need to put the tragedy behind us and get on with our
business because it's there,'' said Richard Smith, director of the
Kennedy Space Center.
   At sea, the searchfor the space shuttle's two rocket boosters,
thought to lie 20 miles apart in the Atlantic northeast of the
doomed shuttle's launch pad, was aided by improving weather. The
search effort was joined by a Navy salvage expert.
   Winds had subsided to seven knots and visibility was four miles,
the Coast Guard said. Waves were reported at 3-4 feet.
   There were more reports that searchers had retrieved some of the
personal effects of the seven astronauts who perished in the Jan.
28 explosion. One television film showed a helmet being fished from
the water, and it was reported that instructional materials from
Christa McAuliffe's space lesson plan had been recovered.
   But NASA spokesmen would confirm none of it, saying there would
be no statements about the astronaut's remains or their belongings.
At least one of the booster search areas was off-limits to all
boats.
   In his address to more than 3,000 people gathered in thick fog
near the giant vehicle assembly building, Smith said, ``As I
reflect back to the events leading to this (Challenger) launch, the
meetings that we had, the weather problems we had, the discussions
we had, there was nothing in any of that that said we did not do
the right thing at that time in attempting a launch.''
   ``We do not understand what happened. That flight, looking at
real time data, was going right down the middle of where it should
go, yet the event occurred. Clearly our most important job in the
next few weeks, maybe even the next few months, is to understand
what happened. And I hope none of you gets discouraged because of
that.''
   In addition to the pep talks by Nelson and Smith at four
locations today, the Space Center set up a telephone ``care line''
so that the 15,000 workers could talk out any problems caused by
the explosion.
   Two pieces of debris, which may have been from the shuttle, were
picked up at Atlantic Beach, N.C. and turned over to NASA. One
piece, measuring eight inches long, was found just five miles from
the boyhood home of Challenger pilot Michael J. Smith by a man
walking on the beach.
   The effort to pinpoint the location of the two booster rockets -
vital pieces of information to finding the cause of the explosion -
has been hampered by seas that restricted use of camera-equipped
robot submarines. One submersible was lowered into the water from a
NASA recovery ship Thursday, then hauled back aboard because of the
turbulent water.
   Dale Uhler, deputy director of salvage for the Navy Sea Systems
Command, has joined the effort to recover major shuttle wreckage.
Representatives of the Navy's commercial search contractor also are
on hand to help plan the search and recovery attempt.
   A World War II Navy salvage ship, the USS Preserver, brought in
the tip of the shuttle's huge fuel tank, but there was no word
where in the large search area it had been picked up.
   For days, the National Aeronautics and Space Administration has
said sonar indicated the right booster rocket was in 1,100 feet of
water 35 miles offshore and the search effort has been concentrated
in that area. The right booster, which apparently allowed flame to
spurt toward the fuel tank, is the chief suspect in the disaster.
   On Thursday, sources said sonar indicated that the second
booster was about 15 miles from the launch pad. Public affairs
officers, under instructions that any statement must be cleared
with agency investigators, acknowledged privately there had been
such indications. But they would not confirm it officially.
   Spokesmen have cautioned that the soundings can't be validated
until robot submarines photograph the wreckage.
   The finding of the fuel tank tip was a different matter. News
photographs showed sailors on the Preserver, out of Little Creek,
Va., lifting the tip of the fuel tank's cone from one deck to
another..
   On liftoff, the 154-foot tank contained more than 500,000
gallons of supercold liquid hydrogen and liquid oxygen. It exploded
73 seconds into the flight.

Associated Press Sun 09-FEB-1986 19:04                          Space Shuttle

             Divers Expand Search For Challenger Wreckage
                             By IKE FLORES
                        Associated Press Writer
   CAPE CANAVERAL, Fla. (AP) - Navy divers Sunday intensified their
offshore search for wreckage of the space shuttle Challenger, but
failed to locate an explosive satellite booster rocket spotted
underwater by sonar.
   The 32,000-pound booster, composed of two solid-fuel rocket
motors, was believed to be in an area 18 miles northeast of the
launch site, where parts of the shuttle's crew compartment, one of
its two solid fuel rocket boosters and other debris have been
reported.
   ``There is plenty of material out there, but they have found
nothing identifiable'' in 100- to 120-foot dives late Saturday and
all day Sunday, said Navy spokesman Cmdr. Arthur E. Norton.
   ``There is nothing further to report,'' he said Sunday evening
after the divers halted their search. The weather and visibility
were good Sunday after heavy rain and lightning hampered operations
late Saturday. The search was scheduled to resume Monday.
   Norton said the 22 divers aboard the Navy salvage ship USS
Preserver concentrated their efforts Sunday in a zone where ``good
sonar images'' showed the 10-by-17 foot ``inertial upper stage''
rocket was resting on the ocean bottom.
   The IUS was to have boosted a $100 million NASA communications
relay satellite into higher orbit after it was carried into space
aboard Challenger, which exploded after liftoff Jan. 28, killing
all seven people on board.
   The Navy focused on the satellite boosters rather than on
searching for the shuttle crew compartment or the boosters that
propel the spaceship because ``they're pretty sure of what they've
got there, and it's in relatively shallow water. So, it's a
bird-in-the-hand type of situation,'' Norton said.
   The IUS, powered by 27,400 pounds of solid fuel, will be have to
be declared safe by Navy explosive experts before it is brought to
the surface by the Preserver, which is capable of lifting up to 10
tons.
   The IUS was considered ``a hazardous object,'' Norton said
earlier.
   ``Our divers are identifying and mapping a small area of the
ocean floor, taking photographs and eyeballing,'' Norton said
Sunday. ``We can leave this (the IUS) and go anywhere that may be
considered more important at any time.
   ``Our people are committed as long as it takes. We may be here
months. ... The idea is to get the job done.''
   Navy and NASA officials would not say if there had been any
progress in recovering Challenger's crew cabin, rocket boosters or
remains from any of the seven astronauts.
   Space agency officials would only say that three NASA ships were
at sea conducting sonar sweeps and photographing underwater objects
with robot subs.
   The vessels Freedom and Liberty were reported in the same
general area as the Preserver. And the Independence was
``positioned about 40 miles east of Cape Canaveral to search for
the right-hand SRB,'' said NASA spokesman Dick Young.
   Recovery of the shuttle's right solid fuel rocket booster is of
particular significance because speculation about the cause of the
explosion currently centers on it. Videotape and still photos taken
after launch show a plume of fire shooting out from its side toward
the external fuel tank, which blew up in a giant fireball.
   Friday was the final day of a Coast Guard search for debris
floating on the surface.
   ``Any remaining surface debris has now been carried well out of
the local area by winds and current,'' said a statement by the
National Aeronautics and Space Administration. ``Present estimates
predict the residual surface debris is scattered in the Gulf Stream
approximately 60 to 100 nautical miles south-southwest of Cape
Hatteras.''

Associated Press Mon 10-FEB-1986 14:49                  Shuttle-Booster Seals

   WASHINGTON (AP) - The explosion of space shuttle Challenger was
caused by the ship's right rocket booster pivoting into the main
fuel tank and crushing it, the industry magazine Aviation Week and
Space Technology said today.
   The magazine's account conforms with the prevailing theory that
the solid fuel booster ruptured between two segments, but it
carries the scenario further.
   ``The white-hot exhaust plume that began to jet from the side of
the booster as Challenger went supersonic at four miles altitude
caused the bottom half of the solid booster to separate from the
shuttle's external tank,'' the magazine said. ``The lower portion
of the booster then rotated outward from the climbing vehicle.
   ``As the bottom of the booster moved outward, its top section
pivoted into the external tank and crushed the upper right side of
the tank, causing the initial flash seen in this area,'' the
magazine said. ``This impact ruptured the tank's oxygen-hydrogen
sections, causing the explosion that killed the seven-member crew
and destroyed the $1.5 billion orbiter.''
   A presidential commission investigating the Challenger explosion
has told NASA to turn over all internal space agency documents on
what a newspaper called the ``potential failure'' of critical seals
in the shuttle's booster rockets.
   Aviation Week quoted no sources for its thesis, but said this is
what ``NASA's interim accident review board believes.''
   The board has ordered tests both on structural design of the
booster - four segments bolted together with ``O-ring'' seals - as
well as lubricants and the seals to see if they had been affected
by unusually cold temperatures in the days before launch.
   The vehicle exploded in the 73rd second of flight and two
seconds before that, a loss of 100,000 pounds of thrust was noted,
a difference that was affecting the vehicle's flight path.
   Aviation Week said the plume of flame coming from the booster
was 5,600 degrees and was directed to where the rocket is attached
to the huge fuel tank's aft end. That caused the attachment strut
to sever, because of the heat, or it broke because of abnormal
stresses created by the leak.
   At the same time, according to the magazine's theory, either the
plume of flame or structural twisting cut the liquid oxygen line
that runs down the outside of the tank.
   Commission Chairman William P. Rogers said he asked for the NASA
documents Sunday after a New York Times article described
discrepancies between internal memorandums of the National
Aeronautics and Space Administration and what space agency
officials told the commission last week.
   Rogers said in a telephone interview that NASA had agreed to
cooperate with the request, but he declined to discuss the matter
further.
   Arriving for today's closed session of the commission, Rogers
said the disclosure ``certainly isn't helpful.''
   He added:
   ``This story made it appear, possibly, that there was some lack
of cooperation between NASA and the commission. That's not the case
and I hope we can correct that.''
   He said a commission meeting Tuesday, open to the public, will
offer ``a more accurate idea of what actually is contained in these
reports.''
   White House spokesman Mark Weinberg, speaking for the commission
appointed by President Reagan, said Rogers ``has requested NASA to
produce all internal documents and reports of investigations
dealing with problems relating to seals on the booster rockets.''
   NASA said Sunday it was assembling the documents.
   ``Dr. William R. Graham, acting administrator of NASA, has
assured the commission of full cooperation from all NASA
employees,'' the space agency said in a statement.
   The 13-member commission planned to review the documents in a
closed-door meeting today and call NASA officials to testify at an
open session Tuesday morning.
   ``The commission is concerned about all aspects of this
matter,'' Weinberg said, adding in reference to the reported
discrepancies, ``Surely this is something of particular interest to
them.''
   The Times said an internal memorandum last July warned NASA
officials that shuttle flight safety was ``being compromised by
potential failure'' of the seals between segments of the solid-fuel
booster rockets that power the shuttle into orbit.
   The possibility that a leak between segments of the right
booster allowed flame to spurt toward Challenger's liquid fuel tank
has become a major focus of the investigation into the Jan. 28
explosion that killed the shuttle's seven crew members.
   NASA documents indicate engineers at NASA headquarters and at
the agency's Marshall Space Flight Center in Huntsville, Ala., were
concerned about such a possibility, the Times said.
   ``Failure during launch would certainly be catastrophic,'' one
NASA analyst warned in a memorandum, the newspaper said.
   The newspaper also noted that a 1982 ``critical items list''
warned that if the seals should fail, the result could be ``loss of
vehicle, mission and crew due to metal erosion, burnthrough and
probably case burst resulting in fire and deflagration.''
Deflagration is rapid, intense burning.
   NASA spokesman David Garrett had no comment Sunday on the report.
   Gil Moore, a spokesman for Morton-Thiokol's Wasatch Division in
Utah, which makes the boosters, said comment would have to come
from company headquarters in Chicago. No one was there Sunday.
   The Times story said it was not clear whether NASA took any
action on the July memorandum.
   At the opening hearing of the presidential commission last
Thursday, Judson A. Lovingood of the Marshall center testified
there had been previous concern about erosion damage the seals,
called O-rings, but that the problem had been thoroughly
investigated.
   A memo last summer from Irving Davids, an engineer in the
shuttle rocket booster program, cited ``12 instances during
flight'' of erosion in the primary O-ring at the seam where the
nozzle segment of the rocket is bolted to the adjacent segment. The
nozzle segment is the open end segment at the bottom of the booster
where the flame and exhaust from the burning fuel comes out.
   The O-rings are made of synthetic rubber and are placed between
the 12-foot-diameter segments of the booster, which are bolted
together. There are four such segments. The rings, a primary and
backup seal, are protected from heat and flame of the solid fuel by
a layer of putty.
   ``We have seen some evidence of erosion of those seals, the
primary seal,'' Lovingood testified. ``We've never seen any erosion
of a secondary seal. But we have seen evidence of soot in between
the two seals.''
   He also said the cold weather at Cape Canaveral on the day of
launch and the preceding days were a concern because they might
have shrunk or stiffened the seals, but he said Morton Thiokol had
concurred the launch should proceed.
   Last summer, the Times said, a memorandum within NASA's
comptroller's office from Richard C. Cook to Michael B. Mann warned
that ``charring of seals'' observed on flights posed ``a potential
major problem affecting both flight safety and program costs.''

Associated Press Thu 13-FEB-1986 07:46                          Space Shuttle

             Wreckage Appears to Contain Part of Cargo
                             By IKE FLORES
                        Associated Press Writer
   CAPE CANAVERAL, Fla. (AP) - While officials reported little
progress in an underwater search for Challenger's boosters, a Navy
salvage ship brought a load of wreckage to port that appeared to
contain parts of the booster from a communications satellite
carried in the shuttle's cargo bay.
   The NASA vessel Independence used a ``deep drone'' robot sub
Wednesday to try to locate Challenger's right booster rocket in an
area about 20 miles east of Cape Canaveral, the space agency said.
   Two other NASA ships, Liberty and Freedom, were using sonar and
remote-control scanning devices in searches for parts of the crew
cabin and other shuttle wreckage believed to be scattered on the
ocean bottom by the explosion that killed the shuttle's crew.
   Pieces of wreckage that appeared to contain parts of the 16-ton,
two-motor rocket booster from the satellite were brought to port
Wednesday by the Navy salvage ship Preserver.
   One of the pieces unloaded at Port Canaveral was described by
dock observers, including a NASA official who asked not to be
identified, as the aluminum-like, ribbed casing connecting the
upper-stage motors to each other.
   NASA spokesman Hugh Harris would only say it was ``very likely''
that the Preserver's divers had recovered some of the potentially
explosive device, called an inertial upper stage, since the
wreckage came from the area 18 miles northeast of the launch site
where it was sighted by sonar last weekend.
   The IUS motors are normally packed with 27,400 pounds of solid
fuel, and they were to have powered the $100 million tracking and
data relay satellite carried by Challenger into a high Earth orbit.
   Navy Cmdr. Arthur E. Norton said he had no estimate of the
amount of material brought in by the Preserver, which was to return
to the same site.
   The Navy also announced that a nuclear-powered, deep-submergence
research submarine was enroute to Florida from New London, Conn.,
to join the search and salvage operation for Challenger wreckage.
   The NR-1 submarine has a crew of seven, can maneuver in depths
up to 2,375 feet and recover objects from the ocean floor, a Navy
statement said.

Associated Press Wed 12-FEB-1986 20:17                  Shuttle Investigation

   NASA Still Unwilling to Blame Rocket for Challenger Disaster
                         By HARRY F. ROSENTHAL
                        Associated Press Writer
   WASHINGTON (AP) - Internal NASA documents showed Wednesday that
top-level officials signed a waiver in 1983, easing ``fail-safe''
performance requirements for the seals between segments of the
booster rockets that help propel the space shuttle into orbit.
   The failure of such seals is suspected as a cause in the Jan. 28
explosion of Challenger and the loss of its crew of seven, although
space agency officials said Thursday they are not yet convinced
there was a booster failure.
   NASA rules require a working primary and backup system for
certain parts and the booster seals fell into that category until a
``critical items list'' change request signed on March 28, 1983 by
L. Michael Weeks, deputy administrator for space flight.
   In effect, the memo said, a backup seal no longer was needed,
although engineers found that when the pressure rises in the rocket
upon ignition there is a bulging of the segments that may permit
gases to pass by the secondary seal.
   ``This condition has been shown by test to be well within that
required for safe primary O ring sealing,'' said the memo. ``This
gap may however, in some cases, increase sufficiently to cause the
unenergized secondary O ring seal to lose compression, raising
question as to its ability to energize and seal if called upon to
do so by primary seal failure.''
   The memo noted that in 18 tests of solid rocket boosters ``no
failures hve been experienced.''
   A failure, the report said, could result in ``loss of mission,
vehicle and crew due to metal erosion, burnthrough and probable
case burst resulting in fire ... ''
   The 1983 document was among internal papers that showed a
history of concern with the ``O rings'' - large circular
rubber-like seals that go around the circumference of the 12-foot
diameter rockets. In report after report, the rings' elasticity and
ability to contain gases where mentioned as critical items to be
looked at.
   NASA officials said also that both the rocket's manufacturer and
space agency experts agreed to the Challenger launch in
sub-freezing weather.
   Attention has been focused on the seals because films of
Challenger's liftoff show a plume of flame appearing to spurt from
the right rocket booster toward the shuttle's main tank loaded with
volatile fuel. The ability of the seals to contain gas and flame is
under close scrutiny.
   ``The cause is still an open issue,'' William R. Lucas, director
of the National Aeronautics and Space Administration's Marshall
Space Flight Center told a news briefing. ``We are investigating
every part of the shuttle and not attempting to focus in too
early.''
   After scrubbing a launch on Jan. 27 for other causes, NASA
engineers discussed the weather by telephone with space shuttle
contractors, including some at Morton Thiokol Inc., which
manufactures the booster rockets in Utah. The overnight low
temperature was expected to be 24 degrees, said Lawrence B. Mulloy,
director of the booster rocket program at Marshall, in Huntsville,
Ala.
   ``At that time no concern was expressed by the solid rocket
motor manufacturer or my people on the solid rocket motor relative
to the predicted temperatures,'' he said.
   Rather, he said, the discussion turned on whether the shuttle
was ready for launch again in a short 24-hour ``turnaround'' period.
   Later that evening there was another telephone conference,
Mulloy said. Thiokol engineers had looked at NASA data on the
possible effect low temperatures might have on O ring performance.
   ``The initial recommendation of the Thiokol engineers was that
we should launch within our experience base - which was that the O
ring temperatures should be 53 degrees.''
   Witnesses testifying Tuesday to the presidential commission
investigating the accident said that despite the bitter freezing
weather on the launch pad, they believed the internal temperature
of the boosters' fuel to be in the 50s.
   Mulloy said NASA decided that if the gases made it past the
primary seal, a secondary O ring would contain them ``as it has
done in the past, even under those temperature conditions.''
   Then, he said, the Thiokol program manager ``recommended
proceeding with the launch under those temperature conditions based
on the engineering analysis that had been done.''
   The temperature at the 11:38 a.m. launch time was 38 degrees.
The lowest temperature in all other 24 shuttle launches, 51
degrees, was on the previous launch on Jan. 28.
   The shuttle rocket boosters, each 149 feet tall, are jettisoned
from the shuttle after they exhaust their fuel after two minutes of
flight. They fall into the ocean under parachutes and are towed
back to port for reuse.
   The documents, which were given to the presidential commission
during a private session Monday, indicated that NASA was worried
about post-flight examinations that showed pitting of some primary
O rings. This indicated that gases had escaped past them.
   ``Morton Thiokol feels that the case field joint poses the
greatest potential risk in that its secondary seal may not maintain
metal contact throughout motor operation,'' said a study by that
firm last August.
   Another study, dated last Oct. 2, addressed ``recent concerns''
over the O rings, saying:
   ``One such area of concern is the ability of the O ring to
rebound to or near its original dimension after having been subject
to compression for various periods of time and-or at various
temperatures.''
   In a related development, NASA's Aerospace Safety Advisory panel
issued its annual report, saying the space agency cannot sustain 18
flights a year, but that it could handle 15.
   The report was written before the Challenger explosion. NASA had
intended to fly 15 missions this year, building to a 24-a-year rate
by 1988.

Associated Press Fri 14-FEB-1986 10:38                          Space Shuttle

Black Smoke Indicates Challenger's Troubles May Have Begun At Liftoff
                          By HOWARD BENEDICT
                        Associated Press Writer
   CAPE CANAVERAL, Fla. (AP) - Photographs of a puzzling puff of
black smoke between Challenger's right solid rocket booster and
fuel tank indicate the ill-fated shuttle probably was in trouble
the moment it left the launch pad, NASA officials say.
   The presidential commission investigating the Jan. 28 explosion
that killed Challenger's seven crew members reviewed film, video
tapes and still photos of the smoke Thursday, and the evidence was
released to reporters hours later.
   Additional examination of film was planned today as the
commission was concluding two days of closed-door hearings at this
spaceport, scene of the worst tragedy in the U.S. space program.
The investigation continued to focus on the possible rupture of a
seal in the right booster.
   The commission, headed by former Secretary of State William P.
Rogers, today began touring facilities at the Kennedy Space Center,
including Challenger's launch pad, a building where shuttle
wreckage from the Atlantic is being collected and an assembly
building where the solid boosters and fuel tank are attached to the
shuttle.
   The members also inspected the three remaining shuttles in the
fleet, Columbia, Discovery and Atlantis. NASA gave the go-ahead
Thursday for workers to resume processing on all three so they
could be ready for flight whenever a go-ahead is given to resume
shuttle missions.
   The National Aeronautics and Space Administration released six
photos, the first two showing normal conditions as Challenger left
the launch pad. The next two clearly show the smoke between the
right booster and the external tank, and the final two show the
smoke has disappeared. The smoke plume appears to be about 4 to 5
feet high and 1 to 2 feet wide.
   The sequence was less clear in a video tape lasting only two
seconds.
   NASA spokesman Jim Mizell termed the smoke unusual and said it
first appeared about 1.4 seconds after liftoff, about one-quarter
of the way up the 149-foot-long booster. That is near the lower aft
O-ring seal, which joins two of the booster's four segments.
   This is an area investigators have been concentrating on since
photographs earlier disclosed a plume of flame bursting from the
right booster 58 seconds into the flight. The theory is that this
flame, perhaps spewing from a burst ring seal, caused the external
tank and its half million gallons of fuel to explode 15 seconds
later.
   ``All I can say is that it (the smoke) is there,'' said Mizell.
``It appears to be on the back side of the SRB (solid rocket
booster). It's very difficult to tell exactly where. I don't think
it came from the main engines,'' which ignite 6.6 seconds before
the boosters power the shuttle off the pad.
   Documents released by NASA on Wednesday showed that the agency
waived its requirement for effective backup safety seals on the
boosters three years ago because engineers were confident the
primary seal would do its job even though this seal had shown signs
of erosion from hot gases on some flights.
   The booster joints are designed with a primary seal and a backup
seal intended to prevent hot gases from leaking out the side. But
in late 1982, according to the documents, engineers found that
rotational forces generated by the enormous pressures in the rocket
could inactivate the backup seal.
   Nevertheless, on March 28, 1983, officials at NASA headquarters
approved a waiver exempting the booster joint assemblies from
fail-safe requirements. The documents said they were confident the
backup seal could be counted on to operate at the most critical
early stages of launching and because tests showed no problems with
having a single seal to hold the gases in.
   The puff of smoke and its sudden disappearance raises another
possibility that was discussed at a commission open hearing in
Washington on Tuesday - that a test hole that leads into a section
between the two seals might have sprung a leak.
   Several days before launch, technicians open this test port and
pressurize the gap between the seals with gas to determine if both
are holding properly. Then they are supposed to close the port with
a screw-like plug that has its own seal, and the work is supposed
to be checked by contractor and Air Force personnel.
   NASA's Lawrence Mulloy, project manager for the solid rocket
boosters, testified that if there is undetected human error and the
plug is left out or is installed loosely, ``that would be a leak
source.'' Other analysts testified a manufacturing defect also
could cause the port to fail.
   ``The task force is continuing to conduct detailed analyses to
determine the exact time, origin, dimensions and other
characteristics of the smoke,'' a NASA statement said late Thursday.
   While the commission looked for evidence, officials reported
little progress in an underwater search for Challenger's main cabin
or its rocket boosters. Winds that whipped up high waves hampered
the efforts of divers Thursday.
   A four-man research submarine capable of deep-water exploration
is to join the search Saturday, and a seven-man, nuclear-powered
Navy sub is expected at the site 20 miles east of Cape Canaveral on
Tuesday.
   Officials reported that so far, more than 13 tons of debris from
the 123-ton shuttle has been retrieved, most of it collected from
the Atlantic surface early in the search.

Associated Press Sat 15-FEB-1986 04:38                 Shuttle-Morton Thiokol

        Booster Maker Morton Thiokol Announces Layoffs
   BRIGHAM CITY, Utah (AP) - Citing an order by the space agency to
suspend some operations on the solid-fuel rocket boosters for the
space shuttle, Morton Thiokol has announced it will lay off 200
full-time employees and put 1,400 workers on a four-day work week.
   Much of the investigation into the Jan. 28 explosion of the
Challenger and loss of the shuttle's seven-member crew has focused
on boosters, for which Thiokol is the sole producer, and in
particular on the O-rings that form a safety seal between the four
sections of the boosters.
   The National Aeronautics and Space Administration issued a stop
work order Feb. 4 that suspended work on some portions of its
contract with Thiokol. Company Vice President Jerry Mason cited the
order Friday in his letter to employees announced the layoffs.
   Spokesman Gil Moore said the layoffs at the company's Wasatch
Division west will be effective next Friday and the four-day work
week will begin the following week.
   About 2,400 of the Wasatch Division's 6,550 employees are
connected with the shuttle program.
   Similar NASA orders went out to Martin Marietta, builders of the
shuttle external tank, and the Rocketdyne Division of Rockwell
International Corp., builders of the shuttle's main engines.
   Moore said he did not know how soon the workers could be called
back.
   Moore said the workers cut back to four days will be allowed to
take paid vacation days to make up for losing income from the fifth
day of the week.
   Sen. Jake Garn, a staunch supporter of the shuttle program who
took part in a mission of the Discovery last April, said, ``I think
the key word here is `suspend' as opposed to `terminate.'
   ``This is not an end to the ongoing relationship of Morton
Thiokol and NASA, but under the circumstances it only makes sense
that certain aspects of the production of solid rocket boosters be
suspended'' until the presidential commission investigating the
Challenger disaster makes its report, he said.
   Garn also said the layoffs were not the fault of workers who
have built boosters for all 25 shuttle launches.
   Russ Bardos, NASA manager of propulsion productivity and
operations support, said Thursday that Thiokol's long-term
contracts were safe, that it was virtually guaranteed a contract

Associated Press Sat 15-FEB-1986 02:46                        Shuttle-Booster

   NASA Report Said Utah Rocket Was Chosen Because it Was Cheapest
   LOS ANGELES (AP) - A seamless booster rocket without joints or
seals was rejected for use with the space shuttle by NASA because
the multi-segmented design offered by a Utah firm was cheaper, the
Los Angeles Times says today.
   Possible failure of a joint on the right booster rocket of space
shuttle Challenger is suspected as a cause of the explosion that
destroyed the orbiter and its crew of seven shortly after liftoff
Jan. 28.
   The seamless booster design was proposed by Aerojet General, a
California firm that built Titan and Polaris missiles.
   Aerojet's design and rocket systems proposed by two other firms
were rejected because Morton Thiokol, the Utah firm that built the
multi-part solid fuel rocket, ``would give the agency the lowest
funding requirements,'' a 1973 National Aeronautics and Space
Administration document says.
   Morton Thiokol's boosters are reuseable steel rocket casings
made up of four segments bolted together at Kennedy Space Center.
   The decision to build the boosters in segments was a serious
error, said Werner Kirchner, a former vice president of Aerojet
General who headed its solid rocket program.
   ``I wouldn't build a rocket the way that one was built,'' he was
quoted as saying in the Times. ``If you put a number of joints in
the rocket, every joint is a potential area of concern. You won't
find any Defense Department rockets built like that.''
   Current Aerojet General officials at the firm's La Jolla
headquarters declined to comment on the NASA report and their
seamless rocket proposal.
   A Morton Thiokol spokesman could not be reached for comment in a
call made after business hours to the company's plant in Brigham
City, Utah.
   In its 1973 statement about the decision to choose Morton
Thiokol, NASA found that the other three bidders would have cost
more, but it praised Aerojet's design, saying it ``precluded
potential failure modes associated with joints and seals.''
   Aerojet General was eliminated early in the competition because
it planned to begin building the rockets in California then switch
to a Florida plant it had acquired.
   NASA concluded that ``any selection other than Thiokol would
give rise to an additional cost of appreciable size.''
   The report said Morton Thiokol would benefit from low labor
costs at its Utah plant, even though there was ``some early risk
because of a lack of experience (in building nozzles).''

Associated Press Mon 17-FEB-1986 16:01                          Space Shuttle

   Underwater Photos Studied For Clues To Challenger Explosion
                          By HOWARD BENEDICT
                          AP Aerospace Writer
   CAPE CANAVERAL, Fla. (AP) - Engineers examined photos and debris
retrieved from the ocean floor Monday to determine if a submarine
has located parts of the right-hand booster rocket implicated in
the explosion of space shuttle Challenger.
   But NASA spokesman Hugh Harris said it probably would be at
least Wednesday before a determination is made on whether
components of the booster have been spotted.
   Recovery of rocket sections could provide a vital clue to what
caused the tragedy because NASA launch photographs show a puff of
black smoke bursting from the booster near a seal on liftoff and a
tongue of flame spewing from the same area 59 seconds into the
flight.
   Challenger's fuel tank, holding nearly 500,000 gallons of liquid
hydrogen and liquid oxygen, exploded at 73 seconds, eight miles
high. All seven crew members were killed.
   A presidential commission investigating the accident has focused
on the right-hand booster as one of the leading theories for the
explosion.
   The crew of the four-man research submarine Johnson Sea-Link 2
reported Sunday it had photographed objects believed to be sections
of the 149-foot rocket 1,200 feet down in the Atlantic about 45
miles northeast of Cape Canaveral.
   NASA said the submarine's mechanical arm also recovered a few
small components which were being studied on the sub's mother ship,
the Seaward Johnson.
   Officials said the photographs and videotapes were brought back
to the Kennedy Space Center for initial study and then were flown
to the Marshall Space Flight Center in Huntsville, Ala., which
oversees NASA's shuttle engine work. The photos are being compared
with pictures of the rocket taken before the Jan. 28 launching. The
Sea-Link 2 crew was taking additional photos Monday.
   Salvaging remains of the rocket, if indeed they have been found,
could take several days because of murky waters and swift currents.
   Investigators particularly want to look at an area near a seal
between the lower two of the rocket's four segments. It is in this
area that the smoke and flame were seen.
   The joints between segments are sealed by a set of synthetic
rubber O-rings intended to keep hot gases and flames confined
within the booster casing. The rings are protected from heat and
flame by a putty-like substance.
   Documents released last week by the presidential commission show
a history of concern among NASA and its contractors about the
vulnerability of the rings. The concerns were linked to a 1983
decision to lighten the weight of each of the two shuttle boosters
by 4,000 pounds and to increase the power of their motors.
   The changes, made so the shuttles could lift heavier payloads,
put greater stress on the joints, the documents show.
   ``Frequency of O-ring damage has increased since incorporation
of higher performance motors,'' said reports by officials of Morton
Thiokol Inc., which makes the boosters, and by the Marshall Space
Flight Center.
   Lawrence B. Mulloy, project manager for the rockets at Marshall,
said there had been indications of ring damage or erosion on only
one of seven flights before the changes were made. He said there
were six instances of ring problems in the next 17 flights that
preceded Challenger's demise.
   ``As the pressure increased, they could open wider,'' Mulloy
said. He said the the new motor's higher temperature and pressure
also could affect the protective putty.
   In one document, Morton Thiokol officials listed 43 ways to deal
with the ring problems. Most dealt with rearranging the rings and
none addressed the potential putty problem.
   NASA officials testified before the commission that three years
ago they had waived a requirement for effective backup safety rings
on the joints. They said they continued to launch shuttles even
though the failure of a single seal could be catastrophic because
they were confident the primary ring would assure the spacecraft's
safety.
   NASA said it is restructuring its investigative task force as a
result of the commission recommendation. Among those likely to be
dropped from the task force are Jesse Moore, NASA's shuttle
director; William Lucas, director of the Marshall Center; Arnold
Aldrich, shuttle program director at the Johnson Space Center in
Houston, and launch operations director Bob Sieck.
   In Washington, in a move tied to the shuttle accident, NASA
general manager Phil Culbertson was relieved of his duties and
assigned to work on special projects for acting administrator
William Graham.
   The general manager post was created when Graham, who was new to
the agency, became acting director two months ago after
administrator James Beggs took a leave to prepare his defense for a
fraud trial.
   Culbertson was a link between Graham and other NASA top
officials. These officials now will report directly to Graham, NASA
spokesman Dave Garrett said.
   Meanwhile, NASA officials continued to assess the impact of a
commission recommendation on Saturday that anyone involved in the
decision to launch the shuttle be excluded from NASA's own internal
investigation of the accident.
   Commission Chairman William P. Rogers issued a statement on
behalf of the panel which said the decision to launch ``may have
been flawed.''
   Sources close to the investigation said warnings before liftoff
that Challenger might not have been safe prompted the commission to
issue the statement.
   The sources did not identify those who had misgivings, whether
they were NASA or contractor personnel, or what the concerns were.
   Testimony before the commission last week revealed that Morton
Thiokol engineers had cautioned against a launch Jan. 28 because of
freezing temperatures during the night. Rockwell International,
which built the shuttle, also expressed reservations because of a
fear that icicles on the launch pad might be knocked off by launch
vibrations and damage the craft's thermal tiles.
   The commission was told by Moore, however, that when it came
time to launch, everyone agreed the temperature, which had climbed
to 38 degrees, was acceptable.

Associated Press Wed 19-FEB-1986 15:59                          Space Shuttle

   Small Part of Right Booster Recovered and Other Pieces Spotted
                             By IKE FLORES
                        Associated Press Writer
   CAPE CANAVERAL, Fla. (AP) - Underwater searchers have recovered
a part from Challenger's right rocket booster, considered a major
culprit in the spacecraft's explosion, and have located other
shattered pieces, officials said Wednesday.
   But there has been no sighting of the section of that booster
which includes a seam investigators believe was the source of a
spurt of flame that may have caused the shuttle's destruction
during liftoff Jan. 28.
   However, ``I am confident we will find all of the right hand
SRB,'' said Air Force Col. Edward A. O'Conner, head of the shuttle
search and recovery operations.
   ``Nothing has been identified as the crew cabin,'' he said at a
news conference, and he would not say if any human remains or
personal effects from the shuttle's seven crew members had been
found. ``It's NASA's policy not to comment on that,'' he said.
   He and Capt. Charles A. Bartholomew, supervisor of Navy salvage,
ran a videotape clearly showing three objects in murky water at a
depth of about 1,200 feet.
   They were the recovered 11-by-20-inch hydraulic reservoir, part
of the steering system for the booster's rocket nozzle; a
stainless-steel sphere about 15 inches in diameter which normally
contains about 3 1/2 gallons of hydrazine fuel for the controls; and a
10-foot-long portion of the booster's expansion nozzle.
   Current theories into the possible causes of the explosion
center on a leak of flame, through a joint between the lower two
sections of the booster, that may have detonated the shuttle's
external liquid fuel tank shortly after liftoff.
   Some investigators think a fault in synthetic rubber O-ring
seals filling the joint may have allowed hot gases from the burning
solid fuel to escape like a blowtorch.
   Both O'Conner and Bartholomew emphasized that it was ``a long,
laborious process'' to locate and identify pieces of wreckage lying
on the sea bottom, and then to determine which to lift to the
surface for close analysis.
   Bringing up the whole right booster could take four to six
months, said O'Conner.
   Reminded that the presidential commission investigating the
disaster is supposed to complete its study in 120 days, O'Conner
said he was speaking generally of the difficulty of the salvage
operations.
   ``It is up to NASA to determine what they want to recover,'' he
said. ``We're doing very limited recovery now.''
   Much of the current emphasis is on photo documentation of all
items on the ocean floor, to be followed by analysis of the photos
by special teams and a determination of the best recovery
techniques.
   The crew of the Johnson Sea-Link II, a four-man civilian
research submarine, has identified 30 pieces of the right booster
and many more smaller items in what O'Conner called a ``debris
field'' about 43 nautical miles northeast of the launch site.
   ``We have a preliminary identification'' of debris from the left
booster at another search area several miles to the south, O'Conner
said.
   The two boosters separated from the shuttle and its external
tank during the explosion and continued flying until a safety
officer radioed a destruct signal to keep them from heading for
populated areas.
   The Sea-Link II is to be joined Saturday by the Navy's
nuclear-powered NR-1, a deep-diving research and recovery submarine
that arrived Tuesday.
   The robot sub Gemini will also join the search Thursday in the
area of the booster debris, officials said.
   In addition, five surface ships are using sonar and unmanned
submersibles in a 10- by 25-square-mile area just east of the
booster debris sites, Bartholomew said.

Associated Press Thu 20-FEB-1986 09:48                       Shuttle-Engineer

 Booster Manufacturer Was Urged To Stop Shuttle Launch, Engineer Says

   BRIGHAM CITY, Utah (AP) - Managers of the company that makes the
space shuttle booster rockets initially opposed a cold weather
liftoff but withdrew their objections the night before Challenger's
ill-fated launch, despite the reservations of at least one
engineer, a company executive said.
   Morton Thiokol engineer Allan J. McDonald, a 26-year veteran of
the company, said Wednesday he testified last week at a closed
hearing of the presidential commission investigating the Jan. 28
disaster that he had urged against launching the shuttle.
   But Thomas Russell, vice president for corporate development and
strategic planning in the company's Chicago headquarters, said
Wednesday that new, last-minute information persuaded top Morton
Thiokol managers to approve the launch.
   He declined to reveal exactly what prompted the company to
withdraw its original objections.
   ``Initially, Morton Thiokol was not in favor of a launch,''
Russell said. ``At a subsequent time in the early evening (of Jan.
27), after considering some additional information, Morton Thiokol
was in a position to recommend a launch.''
   He said the initial concerns centered on the effect of cold
temperatures on the spacecraft's booster rockets.
   But after those concerns were voiced in a teleconference between
Morton Thiokol and NASA officials in Utah, Alabama and Florida,
top-level management at the company's Wasatch Division near Brigham
City then decided to recommend a launch based on new information,
Russell said.
   He declined to say whether the decision was made over the
objections of some Morton Thiokol engineers.
   But McDonald, of Pleasant View, said he told the commission that
his objections were overruled by his boss, Joe Kilminster, who
transmitted a launch-approval letter to NASA.
   Kilminster was unavailable for comment Wednesday, his secretary
said, and could not be reached at home. However, Russell confirmed
that the document carried Kilminster's name.
   McDonald said he told the commission he continued to object to
the launch even after the letter arrived at Cape Canaveral, where
he was stationed the night before the launch.
   He said he turned over detailed notes of his conversations with
NASA officials to the presidential commission, which Friday ordered
that most NASA investigators be pulled off the shuttle disaster
probe.
   The engineer said most of his conversations concerning the
shuttle had been with Lawrence Mulloy, who heads NASA's solid-fuel
booster rocket project at Marshall Space Flight Center in
Huntsville, Ala.
   He said it was a prolonged discussion and that most of the
engineers in Utah agreed with him.
   McDonald said he had feared that the low temperatures would
cause the synthetic rubber safety seals, or O-rings, in the joints
of the booster rocket to shrink and become less flexible.
   At a Senate hearing Tuesday, NASA said that Morton Thiokol
engineers initially recommended against launching the shuttle.
However, NASA told the hearing that the company ultimately approved
the launch.
   CBS News reported that 15 engineers from Morton Thiokol opposed
the decision to launch.

Associated Press Sun 02-MAR-1986 02:13              Shuttle Boosters-Politics

Ex-Senator's Aide Says Political Considerations Major for Thiokol Selection

   DETROIT (AP) - One main reason Utah-based Thiokol Chemical Corp.
was chosen to build space shuttle's solid rocket boosters was
because a former senator heading a NASA budget committee was from
Utah, a one-time aide to the senator reportedly said.
   In its Sunday editions, the Detroit Free Press quoted Kem
Gardner, an aide to former Democratic Sen. Frank Moss, as saying
Moss' chairmanship of a Senate committee overseeing the space
agency's budget pushed the decision toward Thiokol, based in
Brigham City, Utah.
   ``There's no question that Moss' chairmanship had a major role
in the decision - that tilted it,'' Gardner said in the story from
the Free Press' Washington bureau. Moss lost a bid for a fourth
term in 1976.
   The investigation into the Jan. 28 explosion of the space
shuttle Challenger, which killed all seven astronauts aboard, has
focused on erosion of ``O-rings'' - gaskets between sections of the
boosters made by Thiokol.
   Gardner said there was a battle in the early 1970s among the
four booster bidders for congressional support. In addition to
Thiokol, bids were submitted by Aerojet Solid Propulsion Co.,
Lockheed Corp. and United Technologies Corp.
   ``All of the senators and congressmen from each of the
respective states were lobbying, and (then-NASA Administrator James
C.) Fletcher said the technical people should decide,'' Gardner
said. ``That frustrated me because we were hoping to get a little
more help out of him (Fletcher), but I felt Sen. Moss' position as
chairman gave us major clout in lobbying for it.''
   A White House official, speaking Saturday on the condition he
not be identified, said Fletcher was the leading candidate to
succeed James T. Beggs as head of the agency.
   Fletcher, who now lives in McLean, Va., was president of the
University of Utah from 1965 to 1971, when he became NASA's
administrator, a post he held unitl 1976.
   Fletcher announced the award of the booster contract to Thiokol
in late 1973.

Associated Press Mon 03-MAR-1986 07:42                      Shuttle-Geography

        NASA Handicapped By Geographic Separation Of Centers
                             By PAUL RECER
                          AP Aerospace Writer
   SPACE CENTER, Houston (AP) - With 20 centers in 11 states, NASA
does much of its work by telephone and in telephone conferences -
forcing officials to reach decisions without the benefit of reading
one another's body language and gestures.
   ``Telecons'' - linking experts in at least five states - played
a key role in the decision to launch the space shuttle Challenger.
   The presidential commission investigating the shuttle explosion
conducted extensive hearings on the conduct of the pre-launch
telephone conferences and declared NASA's launch-decision process
``clearly flawed.''
   Key centers of the National Aeronautics and Space
Administration's space shuttle program are widely separated. To
link them together for a coordinated effort, managers, engineers
and astronauts criss-cross the nation by air and spend hours
participating in telephone conferences.
   Top management is at NASA headquarters in Washington, but
detailed work of the space agency is conducted at 20 centers.
   Florida: Shuttles are launched from the Kennedy Space Center.
   Texas: Astronauts are trained at the Johnson Space Center in
Houston. The shuttle program office and mission control also are at
JSC.
   Alabama: The engineers who developed the shuttle propulsion
systems work at Marshall Space Flight Center in Huntsville.
   Maryland, New Mexico: The antennae used to relay spacecraft
communications are located at the Goddard Space Flight Center in
Maryand and the White Sands Test Facility in New Mexico.
   Key research is conducted at NASA centers in California, Ohio,
Virginia, Louisiana, Mississippi and New York.
   On top of all that, contractors, who play a key role in the
operation of the shuttle, also are widely separated. Rockwell
International built the orbiters in Downey, Calif. The solid rocket
engines are manufacturered in Utah by Morton Thiokol. The space
suits are made at a Hamilton Standard plant in Windsor Locks, Conn.
   Altogether, there are shuttle contractors in more than 40
states, and NASA has to monitor the work of each one.
   NASA maintains a group of aircraft to speed executives from one
center to another. A fleet of T-38 jets is kept near the Johnson
Space Center to allow the astronauts to use the two-seater
airplanes like commuter craft, flying from one end of the country
to another.
   But often NASA's vital decisions are made on what NASA calls
``telecons.''
   Because of the nation's four time zones, the telephone
conferences often take a heavy toll on sleep. Conferences planned
for 8 a.m. in Florida require California engineers to be in their
offices at 5 a.m.
   Two such telephone conferences played a key role in the
disastrous launch of Challenger on Jan. 28.
   When engineers at Thiokol in Utah decided the shuttle should not
be launched in Florida's sub-freezing temperatures, they had to
explain their findings to NASA decision-makers by telephone.
Engineers in Florida and Alabama were linked by telephone
conference with those in Utah.
   Charts of data had to be photofaxed from Utah by telephone line
and they were late, arriving after the teleconference had begun.
The engineers then had to explain their findings to unseen
managers, without the advantage of eye-to-eye contact, body
language and gestures that play a large role in most
person-to-person communication.
   Thiokol managers detected a hostility in the telephoned voices
from Alabama and Florida that they interpreted as pressure to
change their ``no launch'' recommendation.
   But the NASA managers in Alabama and Florida deny that they
intended to pressure the contractor and they say they had not known
Thiokol engineers opposed launch even after Thiokol Vice President
Joe Kilminster approved liftoff.
   ``I do not agree that the process we were a party to at Marshall
was flawed,'' Stanley Reinartz, shuttle projects manager at
Marshall, said last week. ``But should we have known more from
Thiokol or should Thiokol have provided more information - that's
another question.''
   Reinartz' deputy, Judd Lovingood, last week explained his tone
during the teleconference, saying, ``It's professional to
rigorously ask about the data to understand the logic.'' He said it
was inconceivable that the Thiokol engineers could interpret this
as an effort to make them prove it was unsafe to launch rather than
the traditional requirement that they prove it was safe to launch.
   It will never be known whether different conclusions could have
been reached if the conference had been face-to-face, but it was
clear from last week's public testimony that the NASA officials
never understood the depth of feeling in Utah.
   With the countdown moving toward launch, shuttle program manager
Arnold Aldrich had to make a series of phone calls to satisfy the
misgivings about launch by Rockwell International engineers. Some
Rockwell managers were in California and some of Aldrich's deputies
were in Houston. Again, a major shuttle problem was handled by
telephone.
   In an interview last week, former NASA shuttle director Jesse
Moore said, ``I don't know if it makes any difference if you could
look the guy in the eye or not.''
   Much of NASA's geography problem can be laid to politics. Early
in the nation's space program, leaders in the U.S. Senate and
congress encouraged NASA to locate the centers in a variety of
states to encourage legislative support for the space program. More
members of congress, it was felt, would support the program if the
space dollars were spread around the nation.
   The technique led to a legendary exchange between Sen. Robert
Kerr of Oklahoma and then Vice President Lyndon Johnson.
   When several of the nation's dairy states failed to get their
share of the space spending, members of Congress from those states
fought legislative appropriations for the space program.
   To persuade the dairy state legislators, Kerr offered this
advice: ``Lyndon, you could get what you want if you said the
rockets would be fueled with milk and lubricated with butter.''

Associated Press Mon 10-MAR-1986 00:58                         Shuttle Search


                          By HOWARD BENEDICT
                          AP Aerospace Writer
   CAPE CANAVERAL, Fla. (AP) - Searchers have found remains of
Challenger's astronauts in the debris of the shuttle's crew
compartment, which is resting on the floor of the Atlantic Ocean
100 feet below the surface, NASA announced Sunday.
   A search ship using sonar about 25 miles northeast of Cape
Canaveral made a possible identification of the compartment late
Friday, and divers Saturday positively identified compartment
debris and crew remains, a NASA statement said.
   Recovery of data tapes that were in the cabin could shed light
on the cause of the explosion, but it was not known how well the
tapes survived. Recovering the compartment wreckage and remains
could take several days, depending on the weather and sea
conditions, NASA said.

   Seven crew members died when Challenger exploded 73 seconds
after liftoff Jan. 28.
   Mark Weinberg, a spokesman for the presidential commission
investigating the shuttle explosion, said he could not comment on
the significance of the find to the commission's probe.
   ``I would not want to characterize its importance. That's to be
determined. Clearly all pieces of evidence are important,'' he said.
   NASA's statement said family members of Challenger's crew have
been informed of the discovery, but the father of one astronaut
said he learned through news reports that the compartment had been
found.
   ``I'm angry that I haven't been notified,'' said Bruce Jarvis,
whose son Gregory died in the explosion. ``All through this
investigation I haven't really been contacted.''
   The Orlando resident said the discovery of the cabin helps to
put his mind to rest.
   ``I never did like the thought of them being blown to pieces,''
he said. ``I would have liked to have had some tangible proof that
they just didn't disappear.''
   Marvin Resnik, the father of astronaut Judith Resnik, said NASA
told him about the discovery before it was made public.
   ``It's not going to bring anybody back,'' he said in Akron, Ohio.
   Francis W. Scobee, whose son Francis R. was commander of the
Challenger, said the discovery ``just opens up a lot of wounds
again.''
   The others killed were Christa McAuliffe, a New Hampshire
schoolteacher who was flying as NASA's first ``ordinary citizen''
in space; pilot Michael Smith, Ellison Onizuka, and Ronald McNair.
   NASA in its statement said that, ``In deference to family
wishes, NASA will not make further comments until recovery
operations and identifications are complete.''
   When the remains are recovered they will be taken to a hospital
at Patrick Air Force Base, about 25 miles south of Cape Canaveral,
said NASA.
   ``Assistance in positive identification of crew will be provided
by Armed Forces Institute of Pathology personnel,'' the statement
said.
   ``Local security measures are being taken to assure that
recovery operations can take place in a safe and orderly manner,''
it said.

   NASA spokesman Hugh Harris said he could provide no additional
information on the condition of the crew compartment or the remains.
   Families of the crew members contacted after the NASA statement
was released refused to comment.
   Eleven ships and two small manned submarines have concentrated
their search in recent days in a 350-square miles area about 20 to
40 miles northeast of here. The effort includes three robot
submersibles, seven sonar rigs and 41 divers.
   After the search ship LCU's discovery, operations were suspended
for the night for safety reasons, NASA said.
   The LCU, or Landing Craft Utility vessel, is a U.S. Navy
sonar-equipped support ship which has been used to help map the
ocean bottom during the search for shuttle debris.
   On Saturday, ``the USS Preserver, whose divers are thoroughly
briefed on debris identification, began to work,'' the statement
said.
   ``Subsequent divers provided positive identification of
Challenger crew compartment debris and the existence of crew
remains,'' it added.
   In the days after the accident, 12 tons of Challenger debris was
picked up from the ocean surface. Then searchers turned to the
ocean bottom where recovery is more difficult. About 5 tons have
been retrieved from the depths, including a 4,200-pound piece of
the shuttle's left booster rocket, which was brought into port
Saturday.
   The left booster was retreived from 210 feet of water as a
practice session for retrieving parts of the right rocket later
from 1,200 feet down.
   The right rocket is the chief suspect as the cause of the
tragedy and investigators want to retrieve its debris for possible
clues. Some officials have said the cause may never be found unless
the booster can be examined.
   Photographs show a puff of black smoke spewing from the rocket
milliseconds after ignition and a spurt of flame pouring from the
same area 15 seconds before the explosion.
   The smoke and flame appeared near a joint between the bottom two
segments of the solid fuel rocket.
   There have been reports that some crew remains were found
floating in the water in the hours after the explosion, but NASA
has declined comment on these reports.

   The approximately 15 tons of debris recovered so far represents
only a small percentage of the orbiter and its cargo, which weighed
126 tons.
   NASA engineers last week told the presidential investigation
committeee that they have concluded the explosion was caused by a
failure in the right booster, but they did not know why it failed.
   Using telemetry and computer-enhanced photographs of the liftoff
and blowup, they sketched a chronology of Challenger's final 15
secods.
   In that fatal period, a plume of smoke shot from the joint, and
the booster broke loose from its bottom mooring, swung outward and
pushed its nose cone into the large external fuel tank that carried
nearly half a million gallons of volatile liquid hydrogen and
liquid oxygen propellant.
   The resulting fireball destroyed the shuttle and killed its crew
members while members of their families watched in horror.
   The commission hearings disclosed much disagreement among NASA
and its contractors on the cause of the blast.
   Some engineers at Morton Thiokol, which built the boosters,
objected to the launch because they feared freezing launch-day
temperatures might damage synthetic rubber O-rings designed to
prevent hot gases from escaping from the rocket joints.
   Middle-level NASA managers at Marshall Space Flight Center in
Huntsville, Ala., questioned the concerns and the engineers were
overruled by their company managers.
   Other theories brought out at the hearing include the
possibility that one of two O-rings in the suspected joint was too
small in diameter at one point in its circumference, that the rings
were improperly inspected and reviewed and that a pressure test
port on the joint might have been defective.
   The commission also was told of problems that were encountered
in stacking and joining the drum-shaped segments of the right
booster, a task complicated by a finding that the bottom segment
was slightly egg-shaped and had to be squeezed into roundness.