HOUSTON - Investigation teams delving into the loss of Columbia and its crew hope to know within a week if a newly found flight data recorder will prove useful in deciphering what took place Feb. 1 as the spaceplane broke up during reentry.
Columbia's orbiter experiments recorder (OEX) -- part of the shuttle's Modular Auxiliary Data System (MADS) -- was found outside Hemphill, Texas. The hardware has been brought here to NASA's Johnson Space Center.
Officials say the recorder was recovered fully intact and right side up, in damp ground on a slope. The connector side of the box was embedded in the ground about three inches deep. Investigators are developing a testing protocol to protect the integrity of the information on the recorder.
"The initial estimate would be late next week at the earliest before we even know if we're going to get data," said NASA spokesman James Hartsfield. "It is exciting to have at least the potential for some more data at this point. We didn't have that yesterday."
Recorder specifics
According to NASA's 1988 shuttle reference manual, this onboard instrumentation system measures and records selected pressure, temperature, strain, vibration and event data to support payloads and experiments and to determine what environments the spaceplane experiences during flight.
Similar in theory to so-called "black boxes" that are flown on commercial airliners, the suitcase-sized OEX is not such a device and none are flown or needed on the shuttles because of the volumes of data the ships' radio to Earth during a mission.While all four of NASA's shuttles are equipped with a variety of operational data recorders, only Columbia had this particular type of hardware onboard.
That's because this data recording system was part of Columbia's original instrumentation that was used during the spaceplane's early test flights beginning in 1981. Much of that instrumentation was later pulled from the shuttle to save weight, but there was some amount of data still recorded that wasn't radioed down to Mission Control.
The recorder is located within the crew cabin, below the middeck floor, and carries 9,400 feet of magnetic tape, which running at a normal speed of 15 inches per second allows two hours of recording time.
Although the device itself appeared to be found relatively intact, there may have been some heat damage from re-entry. In any case, no one yet knows the exact condition of the tape inside or if its data can be recovered.
Normally the tape is played back on the ground directly from the recorder, leaving the tape to be reused.
Hopeful news
According to the Columbia Accident Investigation Board (CAIB), the OEX could provide invaluable data.
CAIB spokesman, Tyrone Woodyard, said that recovery of the box could be a real plus in better understanding the waterfall of events that broke up Columbia during reentry.
"We're obviously excited that it has been found," Woodyard told SPACE.com. "We're cautious because we don't know what the data is going to be like. In other words, we don't know how intact that information is going to be," he said.
"We're cautiously optimistic...but it's very promising," Woodyard said. If the box is in good condition and its data retrievable, a playback of the information should provide verification and additional data about Columbia's final fatal dive to Earth, he said.
Sources say the CAIB was about to release additional preliminary findings that might have given NASA some early guidance on what to concentrate on in its return-to-flight effort, however that is likely to be put off in hopes that the OEX will provide some more clarification as to what happened.
Meanwhile, CAIB Chairman, Harold Gehman, Jr., was slated to testify today about the work of the independent group before the Senate Committee on Commerce, Science, and Transportation - but that hearing has been cancelled due to the start of the U.S.-Iraq conflict.
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