The Shuttle (Near) Disaster of 1988

The shuttle Atlantis landed safely on December 6, 1988. But STS-27 was not a routine flight. It could very easily have been a disaster, killing the crew, destroying the shuttle…and ending the program.

Insulation damages heat shield tiles on launch

Hoot Gibson successfully landed a severely damaged Atlantis in 1988

On launch, a piece of insulation from one for solid rocket boosters (SRBs) hit the shuttle during launch, damaging tiles. Lots of mission-critical heat shield tiles. About 700 of them.

You can’t land and live if the heat shield fails. And their heat shield looked very bad when they sent the robot arm, with a camera, to take a look. Commander “Hoot” Gibson told NASA about the damage and down-linked photos to Mission Control. But they were very low resolution pictures—because the Department of Defense wanted them encrypted on this classified shuttle mission.

Mission Control: looks okay from here

NASA looked at the pictures and decided what they were seeing were only shadows on Atlantis’ underbelly. And they told the astronauts not to worry—there wasn’t any serious damage.

“Hoot” Gibson—seeing the images in high-resolution—knew better. But he didn’t argue and brought the shuttle down to what looked like a routine landing. But Gibson was happy and surprised to be alive.

Communication is mission-critical

The lesson: communicate completely and clearly; procedures that prohibit it must be over-ruled. The commander of a spacecraft is responsible for the mission AND for the life of the crew. Gibson later regretted remaining silent. He was a great astronaut with a great record…but that was not his finest moment. Or NASA’s.