May 27, 2003

N.C. State to Help in Investigation of Columbia Disaster

- from Associated Press, Atlanta Journal-Constitution, Mobile Register, Wilmington (N.C.) Morning Star, Charlotte Observer, Orlando Sentinel, Houston Chronicle, Sarasota (Fla.) Herald-Tribune, The State (Columbia, S.C.), Knoxville News-Sentinel, Richmond Times-Dispatch, Tallahassee Democrat, Gainesville Sun, Lakeland (Fla.) Ledger.

By staff report

© Copyright 2003 The Associated Press. Federal investigators are looking for help from North Carolina State University in piecing together clues from the space shuttle Columbia disaster.

Investigators want to rebuild the front edge of the left wing that may have been damaged during liftoff. The university's nuclear engineering department will use a nuclear reactor to measure subtle differences in the makeup of protective panel fragments recovered after the disaster. The differences may reveal where each fragment had been on the wing.

"There were small differences in elements used to make the panels. They may be enough to tell us where each panel belongs," said Patricia Brach, a spokeswoman for the Columbia Accident Investigation Board.

Federal investigators suspect that the piece of foam insulation that fell from an exterior fuel tank damaged a carbon panel or seal along the wing's leading edge and that the resulting gap let in scorching gases that doomed Columbia during re-entry. The space shuttle ruptured over Texas on Feb. 1, killing all seven astronauts aboard.

Some of the panel fragments retrieved after the Columbia disaster are unrecognizable because they were burned and fell as far as 200,000 feet while the shuttle disintegrated. NASA experts reconstructing what they can of the wing in a Kennedy Space Center hangar in Florida need the university's help.

"It's all helpful in solving this thing," said Lt. Col. Tyrone Woodyard, also a board spokesman.

The assignment is the latest forensic quest for the campus nuclear lab, which sometimes uses its 30-year-old reactor for unexpected tasks.

Lab manager Scott Lassell helped state investigators prove that Raleigh AIDS scientist Eric Miller was poisoned with arsenic in 2000. Lassell regularly measures toxin exposures in medical research subjects from around the globe.

"It's a diagnostic tool. You expose matter to radiation, measure what comes out, and that tells you something about the matter," said Lassell, who is conducting the Columbia studies.

At the heart of the Columbia project is a long-established technique called neutron activation analysis, which makes materials radioactive and then measures the gamma rays emitted when their newly created isotopes decay. From those measurements, scientists can tell what's inside.

For NASA, Lassell exposed 20 shards of custom-made carbon material for 24 hours each. NASA knows which manufacturing lots some came from and hopes Lassell can match those of unknown origin to known lots.

Lassell expects his analysis will cost less than $4,000 and will be finished by the end of this week.

"Maybe we can help shed some light," Lassell said.

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