After the space shuttle Challenger exploded shortly after liftoff, a wide-ranging investigation found a culture of complacency at NASA. The possibility of a fuel leak was discussed and warned about at length, but ultimately accepted as just an inherent risk. Fast forward seventeen years to the destruction of the space shuttle Columbia shortly after beginning descent, and the same calculus was at work again.

On this day, February 1, in 2003, a piece of foam insulation over the Columbia shuttle’s fuel tank broke off and struck the wing, damaging its heat shielding. Without the insulation, it only took seconds for the intense heat to disintegrate the wing and the entire shuttle along with it.

Numerous conspiracy theories swirled over the disaster, most widely dismissed. Among them, briefly, was one of famed scientist and author Carl Sagan, who had foreknowledge of the disaster. Sagan received an anonymous letter, 20 years before the Columbia took off, that the rocket would explode due to a fuel leak. As few details were ever mentioned, and the cause of the disaster was wrong, the theory did not gain much traction.