Table A4 Reentry Flight Telemetry From STS-107

Table A4
Reentry flight telemetry for STS-107 from officially published data

Table A4 is simply some of NASA's STS-107-Timeline data entered into another Excel spread sheet for easy data manipulation. All of the data in the gray area is what is currently being reported by NASA while the other data represents the incremental changes in distance, velocity and altitude. The Excel file used to create the spreadsheet below is STS-107_data.xls, (Based on Revision 12 of the STS-107 Ground Track). As a general check of the data's integrity the distance between data points (dS) is calculated using the average velocity and the incremental time between the points. When the values in the last column, dS (Ft.) Calculated, are compared to the values in the column, dS (Ft.), they seem to match very closely. *See technical footnotes below chart.

Time (GMT)

N. Latitude

W. Longitude

Altitude (Ft.)

Speed (MACH)

¹Speed (Ft./Sec.)

dT (Sec.)

²dS (Mi.)

³dS (Ft.)

dH (Ft.)

dV (Ft./Sec.)

⁴dS (Ft.) Calculated

13:44:09

30.83313

-167.5564

395010

24.56

24998

13:47:52

36.39853

-150.8472

288932

24.67

25110

223

1033.69

5457901

-106078

5599701

13:49:07

37.63983

-144.8031

259878

24.58

25019

344.22

1817488

-29054

-62

1876437

13:50:53

38.74388

-136.1424

243048

24.12

24550

106

476.27

2514734

-16830

-319

2602400

13:52:17

38.99255

-129.1507

236791

23.58

24001

376.43

1987560

-6257

-374

2016108

13:52:59

38.89502

-125.7137

233618

23.25

23665

184.81

975825

-3173

-229

993946

13:53:02

38.88306

-125.4816

233457

23.23

23645

12.50

66052

-161

-13

70935

13:53:10

38.84789

-124.8644

232864

23.17

23583

33.29

175789

-593

-41

188671

13:53:34

38.70748

-122.9518

231077

22.97

23380

103.47

546357

-1787

-138

561129

13:53:46

38.61631

-121.9682

230203

22.86

23268

53.44

282164

-874

-76

279221

13:54:10

38.41620

-120.1739

228460

22.64

23044

97.98

517348

-1743

-152

553068

13:54:24

38.27043

-119.0681

227437

22.51

22912

60.76

320841

-1023

-90

320770

13:54:53

37.93257

-116.8958

225610

22.22

22617

120.39

635682

-1827

-201

655892

13:55:12

37.67398

-115.4789

224546

22.02

22413

79.38

419174

-1064

-138

425855

13:55:21

37.53489

-114.7805

224002

21.92

22311

39.41

208135

-544

-69

200804

13:55:41

37.23783

-113.4046

222821

21.69

22077

78.27

413291

-1181

-159

441550

13:56:02

36.88308

-111.9244

221670

21.45

21833

85.21

449934

-1151

-166

458498

13:56:03

36.86626

-111.8580

221612

21.44

21823

3.84

20326

-58

-6

21823

13:56:16

36.62465

-110.9363

220778

21.28

21660

53.69

283490

-834

-111

281582

13:56:17

36.60695

-110.8711

220711

21.27

21650

3.81

20154

-67

-6

21650

13:56:20

36.55353

-110.6758

220488

21.23

21609

11.44

60442

-223

-27

64827

13:56:22

36.51765

-110.5460

220374

21.21

21588

7.62

40236

-114

-13

43177

13:56:24

36.48154

-110.4165

220235

21.17

21548

7.61

40197

-139

-27

43096

13:56:30

36.37187

-110.0300

219820

21.13

21507

22.78

120301

-415

-27

129045

13:57:19

35.38489

-106.7845

217757

20.45

20815

194.06

1024642

-2063

-471

1019953

13:57:24

35.29030

-106.4807

217315

20.38

20744

18.32

96773

-442

-48

103720

13:57:28

35.21480

-106.2388

216845

20.31

20672

14.61

77150

-470

-48

82691

13:58:16

34.28679

-103.2929

210304

19.55

19899

179.10

945655

-6541

-527

955166

13:58:32

33.97970

-102.3245

208380

19.28

19624

59.30

313153

-1924

-187

313991

13:58:36

33.90836

-102.0992

207918

19.21

19553

13.82

72984

-462

-48

78212

13:58:38

33.87283

-101.9869

207607

19.16

19502

6.89

36394

-311

-34

39004

13:58:54

33.57505

-101.0413

205553

18.86

19196

58.10

306796

-2054

-208

307151

13:58:56

33.54052

-100.9311

205311

18.83

19166

6.77

35792

-242

-20

38332

13:59:06

33.36957

-100.3839

204336

18.68

19013

33.68

177846

-975

-104

190137

13:59:30

32.95608

-99.04132

200767

18.16

18484

82.74

436882

-3569

-360

443627

13:59:32

LOS

Technical Footnotes for Table A4:

EI - Entry Interface
LOS - Los Of Signal

Assumed ground speed
Note: the Mach number provided by NASA is most likely the vector velocity of the shuttle through the atmosphere consisting of two components, the forward speed and the rate of descent. Because the angle of descent for a Space Shuttle is typically small usually between 1 and 3° compared to the forward speed this value can be considered negligible for this calculation. Therefore the given velocity is the assumed ground speed.
Velocity (V) = (MACH Number)*(Speed of sound 694 Mi./Hr.)*(5280 Ft./Mi.)/(3600 Sec./Hr.)
Distance traveled between points in miles
(Microsoft Excel code)
C=Sin(Latitude1/57.3)*Sin(Latitude2/57.3)+Cos(Latidude1/57.3)*Cos(Latitude2/57.3)*Cos(Longitude2/57.3-Longitude1/57.3)
Distance (S) = 3959 * ACos(C)
Distance traveled between points in feet
Distance (S) = 5280 feet / Mile
Calculated distance traveled between points in feet
Distance (S) = Velocity (Ft./Sec.) * Time Interval (Sec.)

The chart of Fig. A10 is a graphical representation of the STS-5 reentry flight path. This chart should represent reentry flight data for all shuttle missions because it is based on the reentry flight routine contained in the OPS 304 computer program. The true flight data and reentry flight path for STS-107 will be very different from STS-5 because on STS-107 the Columbia suffered a complete flight control systems failure before she could perform any flight maneuvers. The fact that Columbia suffered a complete loss of flight control It should be noted that throughout the region of time from EI+0 to EI+923 that corresponds to the STS-107 reentry the shuttle should hold a 40° Angle of Attack (AOA) while the rate of descent is slowed considerably through the peak heating region. It is believed that Columbia was unable to maintain the AOA of 40° and descended too fast.

Fig. A10