The Smoking Guns

Comments welcome to tim@spaceport.co.uk.

Courtesy of Ali Abutaha.

Abutaha had discovered flame emanating from the base of the orbiter Challenger at lift-off and had evidence of the massive leak from the SRB as seen from New Smyrna Beach at T+25s. Now he needed evidence of flame between these times. It was the "disappearance" of the flame after lift off that led NASA down the track concluding that the fire had somehow miraculously stopped. This is Abutaha’s description of what happened afterwards.

In 1987, Ali had shown his enhancements of the fire at lift-off to Jerry Hannifin, the Washington correspondent of Time Magazine who covered the space programme. Hannifin suggested that Abutaha contact the ace photographer Ralph Morse at Time Life. As in previous missions, Morse's coverage numbered thousands of images for each launch. Thousands of Challenger images had been impounded and examined by the government. Abutaha flew to New York and spent a day with Morse in the photo vault with the eager permission of senior science editor of Time, Leon Jaroff. Abutaha was allowed access to dozens of trays of slides numbered in sequence.

He spent hours using a light box and magnifying glass and it was obvious he needed help, so Morse offered to set up a projection system and started to review some images himself. He was astounded to see an image of the lift-off showing two pieces of white debris falling away from the top of the right hand SRB at lift-off. NASA had examined their launch images, so must have known about the objects, which explains why the NASA images of lift off do not show the top of the SRB!

Things got even better just as Abutaha was becoming tired and depressed. He asked Morse more about the location of the cameras and then requested a search of images that were taken by a camera on a boat north of the KSC, which would have looked straight up the plume. After a search of many images, Abutaha cried, "there is a fire!" It was between the belly of Challenger and the ET. That meant that the fire started at lift-off and continued through the ascent! Morse was amazed and knew the significance of the find. Abutaha thought that he had won his battle.

The series of images showing the flame were displayed in the viewing room. Others joined Abutaha and Morse. "This will be the cover story next week!" said one of the reviewers. Morse would win an award. NASA must have had a similar sequence of images taken by its own cameras - especially those classic shots looking up as the Shuttle leaves the pad - but told the world that there was no fire until T+59s. Time’s Michael Lemonick was assigned to write the story and he took notes.

"Then something happened", said Abutaha. The interest suddenly subsided, Lemonick backed away and Ali's promised lunch was cancelled. Abutaha told me that later, at the Senate, Marty Kress and Lana Couch, a veteran NASA engineer, saw the pictures. Abutaha said that Kress was enthusiastic. The author did his upmost to contact Ralph Morse to confirm the story, via Hannifin but it was "not possible" for me to talk to Morse, I was told. I tried again when I was visiting Cape Canaveral and the KSC later and enjoyed Jerry's hospitality but got no joy then either. He did not want to discuss it. I managed to get Ralph's fax number and sent a message to try to get confirmation. Ralph would not respond. Was Time Life under pressure from the Government not to publish? Surely Time Life is not that scared of the Government? Kress told Aerospace America, "Abutaha warrants consideration. When are you guys going to publish a story?" Again, nothing happened. Abutaha told me later "this was the same person who later became a NASA associate administrator and told me to go to hell"!

Jay Lownes, the editor in chief of Aerospace America magazine saw the pictures, said Ali and he was interested - but backed off. An article was to be written by someone else but he soon realised that there was "no way the article would be published in Aerospace America". It was political dynamite. The publisher, Jerry Grey had sent a draft to Morton Thiokol! Coincidentally, at the time space journalist Dave Dooling confirmed that Morton Thiokol had planned to extend the 180deg attach ring on the SRB to 360deg before Challenger!

The most important image in the history of the Shuttle programme and Time refused to use it! Abutaha told me what he felt. Time Magazine was the major news organisation in the free world. Facts and evidence came first - "but apparently, they bend in the wind like everyone else!"

Time let Abutaha have five photos with "Print property of Time Magazine". "Personal use only". Abutaha showed the images privately to congressional aides in Congress but nothing happened. He told me that he showed the pictures to some journalists including Craig Couvault. “Either out of fear of NASA, the Government or rejections by Time, no one followed up the story. John Wilford Noble of the New York Times had wanted to write a story about Abutaha but suddenly got cold feet. He refused to take Abutaha’s calls, Ali told me.

Incidentally, if anybody is still dubious, the Time Life images showing the debris coming off the top of the SRB at lift-off and the flame during the roll programme are 06 08-4NN2216 and 0608N111216 respectively. I saw the pictures for myself during one of my meetings with Abutaha in Washington. The flame and gas were as clear as daylight!

The Time Life episode was described by Flight International magazine in 1997, just after I had seen the images for myself during a visit to Washington. For copyright reasons it was not possible to reproduce the images or create illustrations but an image of the Space Shuttle showing the area where the fire was seen was highlighted (see the above image).

E-Book contains the full story (18,000 words) with diagrams and illustrations. Purchase with Paypal £6.50

I read the Challenger Accident report. I found it very interesting and informative. I have always thought that there had to be more to it than a o-ring failure that caused the explosion. I can see the evidence of Mr. Abutaha as having merit. I think it was a combination of factors when put together caused the Challenger Accident.

I always questioned why the films of the launch do not show the top of the stack nor the smoke pouring from the joint. Only when the pad camera pictures were developed do you see the plume of black smoke. As a result of reading your report, I have my doubts of the Roger's Commission Report and the causes it cites. Thank you for making this report available.

The conventional wisdom is that it was faults with the O-rings that doomed Challenger in January 1986. Reading this e-book may well make you change your mind, though - or at least look at the official version of events more critically. Veteran British space analyst Tim Furniss presents a cogent and well-argued case - quoting Ali AbuTaha, the engineer who studied the disaster - that the real flaw lay elsewhere but that NASA chose not to admit it, as this could have triggered a fundamental, time-consuming redesign and a longer delay for a return to flight. The strengthening of the attach ring from a semicircular design to a fully circumferential design - the most obvious redesign - presents a very strong case.