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Columbia Landing Gear Sensor Added to List of Failures
By Jim Banke
Senior Producer, Cape Canaveral Bureau
posted: 03:10 pm ET
13 February 2003
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CAPE CANAVERAL, Fla CAPE CANAVERAL, Fla. -- One of three sensors on Columbia's left-hand landing gear possibly indicated the device had begun to deploy 26 seconds before all contact was lost with the shuttle. NASA officials say it is more likely the sensor failed because the two other sensors continued to indicate the gear was still locked in the "up" position and the sensor failure came at a time when others in the area also were failing off. Moreover, had the landing gear deployed at the point, the remaining good sensors would had detected the massive change in the handling of the shuttle. Changes in drag and temperatures were not dramatic, NASA officials have previously said. The new information surfaced as NASA officials were working on the latest version of the timeline covering exactly what happened before Columbia and its crew were lost on Feb. 1. Previous timelines released by NASA and discussed by shuttle program manager Ron Dittemore showed a number of sensors in and around the left wing were failing off or indicating a heating trend beginning about eight minutes before the contact was lost. NASA is working on a master timeline that combines telemetry from sensors, still and video images of the re-entry, along with recordings of the flight director and air-to-ground loops.
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