Feb 1, 2004 was the first anniversary of the STS-107 Columbia accident.
E-mail discussion within the week before the anniversary led at first
to planning a get-together of Stratofox members to talk about it,
since some of us had been eyewitnesses or helped contact the media.
Some of us a year ago made an effort to make sure the media and NASA were
aware that Columbia was already in trouble over California, and that this
wouldn't be neglected in the investigation.
The discussion quickly expanded as Jay Lawson of Sparks NV asked if it would be OK to try to arrange a meeting of STS-107 photographers who provided material for the Columbia accident investigation. After all, most of them had never met before. Jay invited as many others who took photos and video as he could contact.
The meeting's attendance was about 25, not bad at all for an event only a week in the making that conflicted with Superbowl Sunday.
Remarkably, we had in attendance most of the photographers from whom NASA and CAIB got video of Columbia over California and Nevada, including Rick Baldridge (EOC2-4-0056 from Mt Hamilton CA near San Jose), Jay Lawson (EOC2-4-0026 and EOC2-4-0055 from Sparks NV near Reno), John Sanford (EOC2-4-0009-B from Springville CA near Fresno), and Lionel Machado (EOC2-4-0064 from Fairfield CA). Jay's friend David Goodin of San Jose (who helped him make DVDs of his video) also attended.
Paul Adams (EOC2-4-0030 from Las Vegas NV) and Chris Valentine (EOC2-4-0017 from Wupatki Nat'l Monument AZ) both said they wished they could make it. Jay showed copies of their videos. A video tribute to NASA and the STS-107 crew by Chris Valentine was also shown. (You can download it from his web site.)
All of the videos were shown in their entirety, probably never seen together before, outside of the accident investigation itself. And bringing together this group of eyewitnesses and photographers seemed like this meeting was history in the making, just by bringing these people together for the first time.
It was a privilege to have these guests here and to meet them.
And apparently our meeting was front page news on the Reno Gazette-Journal.
From the Stratofox team and guests, we had
Don Anastasia AA6W (eyewitness),
Owen DeLong KB6MER,
Ian Kluft KO6YQ (eyewitness),
Sean Lynch KG6CVV,
Dave Masten KG6FNL,
Pierce Nichols N1UAY,
Justin Rocha KG6SGU,
Rafael Skodlar KC6LBJ,
Joyce Traugott KG6IAN and
Steve Traugott KG6HDQ (media aerospace consultant.)
There were also other attendees, Stan and Steve, who came after they stumbled upon the web page.
The original announcement page with directions looked like this. The meeting was organized by Ian Kluft (directions, reservations) and Jay Lawson (regional contacts).
See also...
Question: Should we do this again? (added 2/3/2004)
We've gotten e-mails from eyewitnesses, photographers and NASA staff who wished they knew about this meeting because they'd have liked to attend. There are no plans yet for another meeting. And we should wait at least several months anyway for the people who had to travel this time. But if this interest in 2 days is any indication, it should be possible to arrange more.
It may be possible, and one person even suggested, to hold these at different locations near the Columbia re-entry path where some of the photographers live. It really depends if there's a host to make the local arrangements. Or if there's any difficulty arranging another location, Stratofox could host it in San Jose again. Wherever it is, we can host the web page for the event.
Answer: We are doing it again (added 1/12/2005)
The second STS-107 eyewitnesses
& potographers meeting
will be held Jan 29, 2005.