NASA Films Show Shuttle Debris Striking Ocean, Breaking Apart

KENNEDY SPACE CENTER, Fla. — National Aeronautics and Space Administration films show large pieces of the space shuttle’s orbiter--and possibly Challenger’s crew compartment--striking the ocean after falling nearly nine miles, the head of the Navy’s salvage operation said Saturday.

Cmdr. James R. Buckingham, providing the most detailed account of what happened to Challenger after the Jan. 28 explosion, indicated that large pieces of the orbiter survived the blast intact but broke up on impact with the water and dispersed over a 5-by-7-mile oval expanse of the ocean floor.

He said the right booster rocket’s crucial O-rings, or synthetic rubber safety seals, may never be recovered because they tend to disintegrate in an explosion or on impact.

Buckingham would not comment on the condition of the crew cabin, but NASA has said the cabin and remains of the seven crew members have been found concentrated about 17 miles east-northeast of the launch pad, in 100 feet of water.

“Visual data clearly showed things hitting the ocean,” Buckingham said of NASA cameras that followed the orbiter debris after the explosion.

“If it hit one place in the ocean and it was all tied up together, even if it was crumpled . . . there would be a concentration,” he said. “It obviously . . . came down in a small number of pieces.”

The largest pieces, and thickest concentration of debris, have been those of the solid rocket boosters. Those, particularly the right rocket and the joint that apparently failed, are still the primary focus of the salvage effort, Buckingham said.