Saturday, March 22, 2003
NASA grounds fisherman´s hopes of Columbia debris discovery
By JAMES MILLER
NEWS-JOURNAL STAFF WRITER
PAINTERS HILL — A week ago, Mike Capobianco landed a fisherman´s tale with a twist.
For a few hours, a piece of blackened debris Capobianco found on the beach here seemed to have put him and the Flagler Beach Fire Department at the center of the mammoth investigation into the fatal Feb. 1 crash of the space shuttle Columbia.
The debris didn´t come from Columbia. Apparently, it fell from a rocket. But it had lots of people wondering.
“It would have been nice. Maybe that way, they could have found out what happened,” Capobianco said. “Oh, well. It was worth a try.”
In 10 years of fishing from Flagler County´s beaches, Capobianco, who lives in Rochester, N.Y., has caught whiting, sheepshead, pompano and sharks. On March 15, something a little bit different washed up on the beach beside him.
“It looked like a black piece of Styrofoam,” Capobianco said, “one side was as smooth and slick as an ice-skating rink. The other side was all burnt.”
For two days, he mulled what to do with the mysterious piece of something-or-other. On Monday afternoon, with his fishing buddy, 69-year-old George Petsock of Camp Hill, Pa., urging him on, Capobianco asked his wife, Barbara Capobianco, to call the Sheriff´s Office.
“What´s so amazing about the ocean is you never know what you´re going to get out of it,” Petsock said. “We sit down there all the time wondering what we might find.”
Barbara Capobianco´s call on Monday afternoon brought in the authorities.
First came Flagler Beach Interim Fire Chief Shane Wood and firefighter Russell Smith, who went to the Capobiancos´ RV, where they picked up the debris.
It was in a blue grocery bag.
“As soon as I pulled it out, I thought we might have something,” Smith said.
Wood talked to a representative from the United Space Alliance, the primary contractor on NASA´s space shuttle program, who told him to hold on to the piece overnight. Early Monday morning, he came to pick up the debris.
The official was optimistic, Wood said. The piece could be a tile from Columbia, he told firefighters. It could be the first wreckage to wash up on the Eastern seaboard.
“He almost said he knew where the piece was from, and that´s what got us going,” said firefighter Linda Wood, Chief Wood´s mother. “I thought, ‘Oh, this is too cool. It could be a piece of the puzzle.’”
Capobianco and Petsock heard the same.
“It was awful light – something funny,” Capobianco said. “It would be nice if it was a tile, and they could put together what the heck happened.”
At about 1 p.m., Wood came back to the site to check the coordinates. While he was there, his cell phone rang. It could be confirmation from United Space Alliance, he said.
Standing in the sun outside Capobianco´s RV, with the fisherman, a reporter, a photographer and Capobianco´s Chihuahua, Sam, looking on, Wood got the word.
“It´s not from the space shuttle,” he reported. Apparently, it came from a rocket. “I was hoping – just like you guys – that we were going to find the missing link.”
Capobianco took the news in stride. He hoped his find would help the investigation.
He wasn´t too shy about the publicity he would´ve gotten, either.
“My 15 minutes of fame shot down,” Capobianco said, “Oh, well...”
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