Introduction
The space shuttle Columbia broke apart on February 1, 2003, while re-entering the Earth’s atmosphere, killing all seven crew members. The disaster occurred over Texas, and only minutes before Columbia was scheduled to land at the Kennedy Space Center. An investigation later determined the catastrophe was caused by a piece of foam insulation that broke off the shuttle’s propellant tank and damaged the edge of the shuttle’s left wing. The Columbia disaster was the second tragedy in the history of the space shuttle program, after the space shuttle Challenger broke apart shortly after launch in 1986 and all seven astronauts on board perished.