What might NASA have done to rescue the astronauts, had it recognized the peril they faced? Columbia could not have retreated to the International Space Station—it lacked sufficient fuel to move to the station's radically different orbit—but an analysis conducted at the Gehman board's request came up with a list of other options. Here is how things might have been:

(1) Responding to launch-film images of the foam impact, NASA promptly obtains high-resolution ground-camera imagery of the orbiting shuttle. If the images show damage or are inconclusive, two Columbia crew members put on spacesuits and go out of the orbiter to get a firsthand look at the wing, taking pictures of it for analysis on the ground. (The strike occurred at a part of the wing too close to the shuttle fuselage for the astronauts on board to see it without first leaving the craft.) Having confirmed that there is a hole on the leading edge of the left wing, the crew adopts a minimum-exertion schedule, canceling the performance of nonessential tasks and sleeping as long as possible to prolong the time they can remain in orbit before their oxygen and CO2-scrubbing supplies run out. These steps can extend the mission to Flight Day 30. It is now Flight Day 5.

(2) The shuttle Atlantis is put on a rush flight-preparation schedule to launch a rescue mission with a skeleton crew consisting of a commander, a pilot, and two astronauts trained in spacewalking. (Twenty-three such astronauts were available at the Kennedy Space Center.) They are advised of the situation, apprised of the danger that a second foam-related launch accident could doom their mission as well, and invited to volunteer. (How many would have volunteered? My guess is that all twenty-three would have volunteered.) NASA estimates that Atlantis could have launched at least five days before Columbia's crew ran out of air.

(3) In case Atlantis cannot reach them in time, members of Columbia's crew again go out into space, cramming the hole in the wing with tools and pieces of metal and filling it with water, which freezes into ice in the cold vacuum of space. This step, in addition to jettisoning extra weight and adopting a sashay-style reentry flight path to minimize the heating of the left wing, might hold the shuttle together through thermal reentry. Then, at an altitude of around 30,000 feet, the crew could activate their emergency escape system and bail out—since the wing and left landing gear might not hold together on landing—leaving the empty shuttle to crash in a "disposal area" in the Pacific south of Fiji.

(4) Atlantis launches safely, however, and docks within thirty feet of Columbia. Escorted by the two spacewalking astronauts, the Columbia crew crosses over to Atlantis, which returns safely to Earth with all eleven men and women aboard—a mission well within its capacities. Once they are back on Earth, Columbia, which cannot be landed by remote control, is de-orbited and ditched. Seven lives have been saved, at an acceptable level of risk to four others.

NASA now says that when shuttle missions resume next year, a second shuttle will always be kept at the ready in case a rescue is required. That may save lives some day but it does little to reduce the sorrow and shame one feels when considering that NASA could have pulled off the greatest rescue in the history of spaceflight rather than presiding over one of its worst disasters. The officials directly at fault deserve to be held responsible, and have been, but as the Gehman board notes, the crash resulted from "persistent, systemic flaws" in NASA management, and problems of this magnitude cannot be solved just by changing the nameplates on office doors. "Both accidents were 'failures of foresight' in which history played a prominent role," the board concluded. By "history" they meant the dangerous habit of becoming complacent about a persistent hazard. NASA managers knew they had problems with flying foam prior to the Columbia crash—just as, seventeen years earlier, they knew they had problems with the O-rings that held parts of the shuttle together, before an O-ring failure blew up the Challenger.

The board also recommended transformations in NASA's "culture," but conceded that "the changes we recommend will be difficult to accomplish— and will be internally resisted." In other words, don't hold your breath. If manned spaceflight is going to get substantially safer, the best hope is not a sociological revolution at NASA but to "replace the shuttle as soon as possible" with a new and safer vehicle. Bush didn't have much choice about axing the shuttle.

Amongst everything else currently going, here's yet another thing to make us sad.