Photo: NASA derivative work: DrNegative, Cropped portion of original photo highlighting crew-cabin with a highlighted arrow for clarity.
The crew cabin and many other vehicle fragments were eventually recovered from the ocean floor after a lengthy search and recovery operation. The exact timing of the death of the crew is unknown; several crew members are known to have survived the initial breakup of the spacecraft. The shuttle had no escape system, and the impact of the crew compartment with the ocean surface was too violent to be survivable.
The disaster resulted in a 32-month hiatus in the shuttle program and the formation of the Rogers Commission, a special commission appointed by United States President Ronald Reagan to investigate the accident. The Rogers Commission found NASA‘s organizational culture and decision-making processes had been key contributing factors to the accident. NASA managers had known since 1977 that contractor Morton Thiokol‘s design of the SRBs contained a potentially catastrophic flaw in the O-rings, but they had failed to address this problem properly. They also disregarded warnings (an example of “go fever”) from engineers about the dangers of launching posed by the low temperatures of that morning, and failed to adequately report these technical concerns to their superiors.
As a result of the disaster, the Air Force decided to cancel its plans to use the Shuttle for classified military satellite launches from Vandenberg Air Force Base in California, deciding to use the Titan IV instead.
Since 1986, NASA has landed multiple rovers on Mars and discovered flowing water on the Red Planet. NASA has completed the International Space Station, where astronauts have lived for 15 years. And, it has sent New Horizons to Pluto to take photos of the dwarf planet.
