Shuttle Mission 2007 Crack: Space
STS-118 was no exception. Launched on August 8, 2007, Endeavour carried the SPACEHAB module and the S5 truss to the International Space Station (ISS). Commander Scott Kelly led a crew of seven. At T+58 seconds into ascent, a 0.25-pound piece of foam insulation—precisely the kind that doomed Columbia —broke away from the external tank’s (ET) "bipod ramp" region and struck the underside of Endeavour near the landing gear door. High-resolution post-launch imagery revealed a gouge in tile number V6 (a reinforced carbon-carbon tile near the nose landing gear door). The gouge measured approximately 3.5 inches by 2 inches, with a depth of nearly 1 inch.
The decision: , but with a modified reentry profile—a shallower angle of attack to reduce thermal and aerodynamic loads on the left OMS pod. They also added a 4-hour thermal soak at 160,000 feet to allow gradual heating. Space Shuttle Mission 2007 Crack
The crack was traced to a manufacturing defect: a titanium weld that had cooled too quickly in 1989, creating a microscopic martensitic phase inclusion. That tiny inclusion cycled through 18 flights (STS-118 was Endeavour’s 20th mission) before finally propagating. The 2007 crack is a haunting case study in risk management. Unlike the dramatic foam strike of Columbia , this was a quiet, cumulative failure—a slow betrayal by metallurgy. It revealed that even after the most rigorous post-Columbia redesigns, the Shuttle remained a fragile, aging machine held together by inspection intervals and statistical margins. STS-118 was no exception
Below is a deep, factual analysis of the most significant "crack" event in 2007: the . Deep Text: The Crack That Almost Broke the Shuttle – STS-118 and the Silent Failure The Context: Return to Flight After Columbia By 2007, NASA was still reeling from the Columbia disaster (STS-107, 2003), which was caused by foam debris striking the reinforced carbon-carbon (RCC) of the left wing’s leading edge. In response, two “Return to Flight” missions (STS-114 and STS-121) tested new inspection protocols, tile repair kits, and on-orbit imaging. Every mission thereafter carried an almost pathological fear of debris strikes. At T+58 seconds into ascent, a 0
But the deeper story unfolded days later.
