Multiple factors including the nature of the damage to the shuttle, the limitations of available technology, and the absence of a plan for an emergency rescue of the shuttle in this situation meant Kalpana Chawla and her six fellow crew members aboard Space Shuttle Columbia (STS-107) could not be saved.
Damage sustained on the January 16, 2003 launch was the source of the disaster. A piece of external fuel tank degraded and hit the shuttle’s left wing. It was such an impact which broke the shuttle’s thermal protection system, this for shielding the shuttle from the extreme heat of re-entry. But at the time, NASA engineers and mission controllers didn’t underestimate the damage as much as they should have. However, they didn’t think it would be fatal because there have been similar incidents in other missions and things have gone on without catastrophic results.
If the damage had been considered critical, there were very few rescue options. NASA did not have a shuttle ready for a quick launch; the shuttle was already in orbit. The standard would have taken too long trying to construct a rescue plan from scratch. There was only one other possible option: a crew would have been required to stay in orbit longer, so that another shuttle could be prepared for a rescue mission, but Columbia’s life support systems could not sustain the crew for an extended period.
Because it reentered Earth’s atmosphere with a compromised thermal protection system, that proved fatal. The damaged wing was penetrated by hot gases that led to structural failure and the eventual breakup of the shuttle as the remains fell over Texas. Unfortunately, when the full extent of the problem became apparent, there was no way to prevent Columbia and its crew, including Kalpana Chawla, from going to the bottom. The disaster gave NASA major changes to its safety protocols, including better detection and response to such damage for future missions.
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