Tonight at 9p ET/PT, a brand-new CNN Original Series examines the 2003 Columbia Space Shuttle disaster featuring exclusive interviews and revealing never-before-broadcast footage. Space Shuttle Columbia: The Final Flight tells the story of the ticking clock of Columbia’s final mission in dramatic detail, beginning months before the troubled launch, unfolding across the sixteen days in orbit, and concluding with the investigation into the tragic loss of the seven astronauts’ lives. Executive Producer Emma Whitehead tells us more:
In creating this series, you had wide-ranging access to NASA’s archives and interviewed people who had never spoken publicly about the Columbia disaster. What can viewers expect to see in this series that they haven’t ever seen before?
We are very grateful to everyone who spoke to us during the making of this series. It has been over 20 years since the disaster but the events are still incredibly raw and emotional for everyone who was interviewed. However, the passage of time has meant that families and NASA employees are more open to discussing what happened and can offer new insights.
For this series, we only wanted to interview those with a direct connection to the disaster. As a result, the viewer is taken back to the events of 2003 and experiences how events unfolded from the viewpoints of our contributors. The astronauts' children were so young when the disaster happened, so filming with them now means that they can speak for the first time with dual reflection and perspective: they remember how they felt at the time, but they are also able to look back as adults and reflect on events in a different way.
We are privileged to be able to include archive from 2003, including incredible and often intimate footage shot by astronaut Dave Brown during training and the mission. This footage allows you to see and hear from the astronauts themselves and allows us as an audience to really get to know them. Unusually, a film crew was also inside Mission Control on the day of re-entry, so we were able to use this footage to show how NASA responded as the news of the disaster unfolded. Ultimately, because of the wealth of archive, the series is an immersive experience.
In the modern era of private space travel funded by billionaires, why is it important to revisit the legacy of NASA’s Space Shuttle program?
Space and the notion of exploring what lies beyond Earth remains fascinating for millions of people across the world. NASA is also one of the most famous institutions in the world and there remains huge interest in what they do. Its space shuttle program revolutionised space travel and paved the way for this new era of commercial space exploration. The ability to visit space is the ultimate adventure and only available to the chosen few who become astronauts. But we must always remember that it will always involve enormous risk, which is of course evident in this series.
Examining the past and what has happened before is essential. Understanding people’s motivations and decision-making means you can learn and move forward. Although the series focuses on the STS-107 mission and the extraordinary people involved, we hope it goes beyond space travel and examines the universal human condition. As humans, we often reflect on things we could have done differently, things we could have changed. We hope the series shows the lessons learned on the Columbia mission for future generations of human space flight.
