• Our spoiler embargo for the non-DLC content for Pokémon Legends: Z-A is now lifted! Feel free to discuss the game freely across the site without the need of spoiler tabs, and use content from the game within your profiles!

Astronauts Diary Survives Columbia Explosion

Status
Not open for further replies.
GuitarHero

GuitarHero

Whats my age again?
Joined
Feb 1, 2007
Messages
883
Reaction score
2
http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20081003/ap_on_re_mi_ea/ml_israel_astronaut_s_diary

By SHAWNA OHM, Associated Press Writer Fri Oct 3, 6:45 AM ET

JERUSALEM - Pages from an Israeli astronaut's diary that survived the explosion of the space shuttle Columbia and a 37-mile fall to earth are going on display this weekend for the first time in Jerusalem.

The diary belonged to Ilan Ramon, Israel's first astronaut and one of seven crew members killed when Columbia disintegrated upon re-entering the atmosphere on Feb. 1, 2003. Part of the restored diary will be displayed at the Israel Museum beginning Sunday.

A little over two months after the shuttle explosion, NASA searchers found 37 pages from Ramon's diary, wet and crumpled, in a field just outside the U.S. town of Palestine, Texas. The diary survived extreme heat in the explosion, extreme atmospheric cold, and then "was attacked by microorganisms and insects" in the field where it fell, said museum curator Yigal Zalmona.

"It's almost a miracle that it survived — it's incredible," Zalmona said. There is "no rational explanation" for how it was recovered when most of the shuttle was not, he said.

NASA officials did not immediately respond to requests for comment.

The U.S. space agency returned the diary to Ramon's wife, Rona, who brought it to forensics experts at the Israel Museum and from the Israeli police. The diary took about a year to restore, Zalmona said, and it took police scientists about four more years to decipher the pages. About 80 percent of the text has been deciphered, and the rest remains unreadable, he said.

Two pages will be displayed. One contains notes written by Ramon, and the other is a copy of the Kiddush prayer, a blessing over wine that Jews recite on the Sabbath. Zalmona said Ramon copied the prayer into his diary so he could recite it on the space shuttle and have the blessing broadcast to Earth.

Most of the pages contain personal information which Ramon's wife did not wish to make public, he said.

"We agreed to do the restoration completely respecting the family's privacy and the sensitivity about how intimate the document is," museum director James Snyder said.

The diary provides no indication Ramon knew anything about potential problems on the shuttle. Columbia's wing was gashed by a chunk of fuel tank foam insulation at liftoff and broke up in flames just 16 minutes before it was scheduled to land at the Kennedy Space Center in Florida. All seven astronauts on board were killed.

The diary is being displayed as part of a larger exhibit of famous documents from Israel's history, held to mark the country's 60th anniversary this year. Also on display will be Israel's 1948 declaration of independence, the 1994 peace treaty with Jordan and a bloodstained sheet of paper with lyrics to a peace anthem that was carried by Prime Minister Yitzhak Rabin at the time of his assassination in 1995.
Click to expand...

To think that something like that would make it through after the accident and sitting in the elements for two months.
 
Misty said:
did anyone else chuckle when they said the pages were discovered in "Palestine"?
Click to expand...

Creepy isn't it? But other than that, this entire article seems like a miracle...the world is a very strange place.
 
That was an amazing story. Just think, that a diary survived that long and so much of it could be deciphered....
 
...you know, that was news back in 2003 when our press reported on pretty much everything of Ramon's that they found (excluding human remains, there's a limit to everything). Now it's more like... a morbidly amazing anecdote. I dunno, I would've figured the American press would've picked that up back when Columbia exploded, it's kind of silly that it's considered news now.

In any case, I'm convinced I saw these two pages already at the Haifa Science Museum (along with a near-complete flag of Israel and some signed CDs that survived the explosion), but maybe they were just copies or something and they're only displaying the real pages now. But I know I've seen 'em.

Also, on a semi-unrelated note:

Also on display will be Israel's 1948 declaration of independence, the 1994 peace treaty with Jordan and a bloodstained sheet of paper with lyrics to a peace anthem that was carried by Prime Minister Yitzhak Rabin at the time of his assassination in 1995.
Click to expand...

Ew ew ew ew I can't believe they're still holding on to that I always want to hurl when I see photographs of that thing D= This is why I hate my childhood.

(I'm going to go there, it's 20 minutes away by bus + five minutes of walking.)
 
Kameil said:
What?
Click to expand...

I believe MB is referring to Hitlers supposed diaries that were found many years ago (sometime in the twentieth century) that were later proven to be fake. I only barely remember hearing about in government class 5 years ago but I guess people thought they were real for quite some time.
 
Snake Bandage said:
That was uncalled for.

I'm probably going to the exhibit this week, due to not having anything better to do.
Click to expand...

Uh... yeah, maybe that was...

It's just that I just find it hard to belive that a diary survivied an inferno like that an was suggesting it might be fake...
 
Status
Not open for further replies.
Back
Top Bottom