“It is during this period of reentry,” John Stangley interjected between Mission Control communications, “that Atlantis makes the transition from spacecraft to aircraft. As she continues to drop in altitude and the atmosphere becomes more dense, her control surfaces such as rudder and elevons become active. This is the hallmark of the transition from spacecraft to aircraft.”
MCC (mission control center) Commentator: Atlantis now well into Entry Interface with current altitude of two-hundred seventy-five thousand feet. Standing by for communications blackout.
“Now, this is always a nervous time for engineers at Mission Control,” Stangley said with excitement, feeling the pace of his speech quicken. “This period of communications blackout—it’s a normal part of every orbiter reentry. As the orbiter slices down through Earth’s atmosphere,” Stangley said while demonstrating with an orbiter model, “there is terrific heating going on all around the orbiter. Now, we’ve talked about this in the past—it’s those heat resistant tiles on the orbiter’s underbelly that are going to fight back the heat and protect the astronauts. The heated atoms of air form an impenetrable barrier around the orbiter that blocks incoming or outgoing radio signals—that is, radio signals sent from Mission Control up to Atlantis, or from Atlantis down to Mission Control.”
Stangley paused for a few seconds to listen to the NASA announcer. “Okay, we’re just seconds now from entering the blackout period for Atlantis—the point of reentry when an orbiter is between about two-hundred-sixty-five-thousand feet down to about one-hundred-sixty-five-thousand feet. It’s expected to take Atlantis approximately sixteen minutes to pass through this blackout region. Let’s hope and pray that Atlantis’s heat shield holds during reentry.”
Chapter 77
Simultaneously, Kennedy Space Center, Florida
A FLIGHT OF FOUR F-15E Strike Eagles vaporized the late-morning Atlantic marine layer, scorching a path as they flew. They materialized at a point on the horizon directly south of the Kennedy Space Center. They came fast and with purpose, their bellies laden with eight AMRAAM fire-and-forget missiles.
“Four Eagles ten seconds out from the south on a heading of zero-one-niner at fifteen-hundred feet above the deck,” the officer called out, his eyes glued to the radar-tracking screen at his station. “I’ve got four helos now from the northeast—all Sikorskys, two 60Ns and two 3Ds. It’s Marine-one, sir. ETA eight, no, seven minutes now.”
The F-15Es crossed the coastline and broke formation with a percussive force that shook windows and bones over a two-mile radius. In the rear cockpit of each of the four jets, a weapons-systems officer watched his four screens for any new radar information, checked for infrared heat signatures on the ground, monitored weapons status, and assisted with aircraft navigation through a real-time electronic terrain map.
It was the work of the U.S. Air Force’s 45th Space Wing.
Nearby the Kennedy Space Center, at Patrick Air Force Base, the Manned Spaceflight Support Office of the Department of Defense had established a round-the-clock support operations center for Columbia’s rescue mission, STS-300. The center provided standard services such as contingency landing-site and medical support, but also was ready in the event of such emergencies as off-runway landings or other threats to astronauts. The center also coordinated with NASA security.
Today was different, however. NASA and the Air Force were as prepared for this landing as they had been for all previous landings at the Kennedy Space Center. But now, NASA was minutes away from completing that which had been thought impossible: NASA was bringing the crew of Columbia home. NASA had summitted the equivalent of ten Everests, and had made it look easy.
Today’s mission, as it had been given to the men and women of the 45th Space Wing, was simple and clear: Atlantis and her combined crew of 11 astronauts were to land safely—without exception.
If the Twin Towers of the World Trade Center had been a terrorist target because they represented America’s economic power, then the space shuttle was equally a target, since it represented the sum of America’s technological sophistication. The shuttle was an American icon, a national asset whose majestic launches and landings pulled at heartstrings and symbolized America’s roots—the roots of patriotism, of exploration, and of discovery—of where we have been and how far we’ve come.
There could be no breach in security, not by land, nor sea, nor air. Heavily armed SWAT teams were positioned throughout the 140,000-acre spaceport. Helicopter gunships in coordination with fighter jets above patrolled a 12-mile radius of the runway, meticulously searching for threat, but in particular the enemy prepared to launch a shoulder-fired heat-seeking missile at Atlantis.
The four identically painted Marine-1 Sikorsky helicopters hovered over the shuttle landing facility briefly, as Marines on the ground readied the site for arrival. After a signal from the ground, one of the 60Ns quickly dropped from formation and landed. The door opened immediately and a Marine appeared and saluted. He stepped aside. A second later, the president of the United States appeared in the doorway and waved to the lucky hundred or so seated in the bleachers. Before a single minute could pass, he was taken away to a secured area by a three-car Cadillac-1 motorcade.
Chapter 78
On Atlantis
Tuesday, Feb. 11, 2003
ON THE MID-DECK OF ATLANTIS, Columbia’s crew sat recumbent in their seats, wrestling with a new problem: the sobering effect of gravity. Their physical strength had silently and progressively slipped away during their activity-restricted mission from hell. The microgravity environment of space had asked so little of their bodies that the daily decrement in strength came with little or no apparent cost, no immediate effect on their function. This muscle weakening progressed in increments too small to
