| Spectators
were euphoric as they waited for the Columbia to return
from space, according to Montana State University-Bozeman
students and faculty who were in Florida among them. |
| High
spirits turned into confusion, though, when the countdown
clock reached zero and started climbing again and no one
explained why they hadn't heard a sonic boom or seen the
spacecraft. And no one told them why the dignitaries and
astronaut's families were escorted away from the landing
site or why the MSU team had to board their buses without
seeing a landing. |
| "Confusion
finally turned into horror as people called friends and
family on their cell phones and later tuned into CNN only
to see the Columbia disintegrating in the blue skies over
Texas," Stephanie Barton said after returning to Bozeman.
|
| "People
were shocked. We could see people just gasping and looking
on in horror at the video of what had just happened,"
said Barton, a senior from Whitefish. |
| "I
didn't believe anything was wrong," said Kristina Hale,
a junior from the East Coast. When she turned on the television
and didn't see a landing, "I honestly thought it was because
of security measures; maybe they were going to land in
California." |
| Hale
finally heard a maid yelling that the Columbia was falling
apart, but wanted to believe it was just a satellite. |
| "It
was just unbelievable," Hale said. "... I will never forget
it. It was terrible." |
| Kelli
Buckingham-Meyer was alone in her room, watching NASA
television, when the Columbia was supposed to land. NASA
kept saying the same thing over and over--that it had
lost contact with the shuttle and had no further information.
It wasn't until the other MSU researchers returned that
she switched stations and learned about the tragedy. |
| "I
was shocked," said the research specialist with MSU's
Center for Biofilm Engineering. "I didn't want to believe
that. I think that's part of the reason I hadn't changed
the station. I didn't want to think anything bad had happened."
|
| Barton
and Hale were two out of four MSU undergraduate students
who were in Florida for the Feb. 1 landing. Others were
Ailyn Perez-Osorio from Billings and Laura Eaton of Sheridan,
Wyo. Besides Buckingham-Meyer, MSU microbiologists there
were Barry Pyle, Elinor Pulcini, '01 PhD, and Susan
Broadaway. |
| The
researchers were in Florida because they had designed
an experiment that was flying on the shuttle and needed
to retrieve their equipment and results. Since the tragedy,
the scientists have done limited analysis of their ground
samples, but all the results that would have come from
the onboard samples were lost. |
 |
Shortly
after the Columbia made the very first Shuttle flight
(STS-1) in April of 1981, Montana State University
College of Engineering alumni who worked for the
main shuttle contractor, Lockheed, presented then
dean Bryon Bennett with an American flag and flight
patch which were flown aboard the mission. It wasframed
together with a signed certificate by the pilots
John Young and Bob Crippen. |
|
