APPENDIX A A.1 ACTIVATION OF THE COLUMBIA ACCIDENT INVESTIGATION BOARD

¶At 8:59:32 a.m. Eastern Standard Time on Saturday, February 1, 2003, communication with the Shuttle Columbia was lost. Shortly after the planned landing time of 9:16 a.m., NASA declared a Shuttle Contingency and executed the Agency Contingency Action Plan for Space Flight Operations that had been established after the Space Shuttle Challenger accident in January 1986. As part of that plan, NASA Administrator Sean OʼKeefe deployed NASAʼs Mishap Investigation Team, activated the Headquarters Contingency Action Team, and, at 10:30 a.m., activated the International Space Station and Space Shuttle Mishap Interagency Investigation Board.

¶The International Space Station and Space Shuttle Mishap Interagency Investigation Board is designated in Appendix D of the Agency Contingency Action Plan as an external investigating board that works to uncover the "facts, as well as the actual or probable causes of the Shuttle mishap" and to "recommend preventative and other appropriate actions to preclude the recurrence of a similar mishap."1 The Board is composed of seven members and is chartered with provisions for naming a Chairman and additional members. The seven members take their position on the Board because they occupy specific government posts. At the time of the accident, these individuals included:

Chief of Safety, U.S. Air Force: Major General Kenneth W. Hess
Director, Office of Accident Investigation, Federal Aviation Administration: Steven B. Wallace
Representative, U.S. Air Force Space Command: Brigadier General Duane W. Deal
Commander, Naval Safety Center: Rear Admiral Stephen A. Turcotte
Director, Aviation Safety Division, Volpe National Transportation Systems Center, Department of Transportation: Dr. James N. Hallock
Representative, U.S. Air Force Materiel Command: Major General John L. Barry
Director, NASA Field Center or NASA Program Associate Administrator (not related to mission): Vacant

¶vestigation

¶Upon activating the Board, Administrator OʼKeefe named Admiral Harold W. Gehman Jr., United States Navy (retired), as its Chair, and G. Scott Hubbard, Director of NASA Ames Research Center, as the NASA Field Center Director representative. In addition to these eight voting members, contingency procedures provided for adding two non-voting NASA representatives, who helped establish the Board during the first weeks of activity but then returned to their regular duties. They were Bryan D. OʼConnor, NASA Associate Administrator for Safety and Mission Assurance, who served as an ex-officio Member of the Board, and Theron M. Bradley Jr., NASA Chief Engineer, who served as the Boardʼs Executive Secretary. Upon the Boardʼs activation, two NASA officials, David Lengyel and Steven Schmidt, were dispatched to provide for the Boardʼs administrative needs. J. William Sikora, Chief Counsel of the Glenn Research Center in Cleveland, Ohio, was assigned as the counsel to the Board.

¶By noon on February 1, NASA officials notified most Board members of the mishap and issued tentative orders for the Board to convene the next day at Barksdale Air Force Base in Shreveport, Louisiana, where the NASA Mishap Investigation Team was coordinating the search for debris. At 5:00 p.m., available Board members participated in a teleconference with NASAʼs Headquarters Contingency Action Team. During that teleconference, Gehman proposed that the International Space Station and Space Shuttle Mishap Interagency Investigation Board be renamed the Columbia Accident Investigation Board. OʼKeefe accepted this change and formally chartered the Board on Sunday, February 2, 2003.

¶On Sunday, Board members flew on government and commercial aircraft to Barksdale Air Force Base, where at 6:50 p.m. Central Standard Time the Board held its first official meeting. The Board initiated its investigation on Monday, February 3, at 8:00 a.m. Central Standard Time. On Tuesday morning, February 4, the Board toured the debris field in and around Nacogdoches, Texas, and observed a moment of silence. On Thursday, February 6, the Board relocated to the Johnson Space Center, eventually settling into its own offices off Center grounds. That evening, the Board formally relieved the NASA Headquarters Contingency Action Team of its interim responsibilities for initial accident investigation activities. The Board assumed operational control of the debris search and recovery efforts from NASAʼs Mishap Investigation Team, which functioned under the Boardʼs direction until the completion of the search in early May.

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