EP76 Crisis comms at NASA, part 2: Challenger vs. Columbia crisis responses

About this episode

The episode discusses crisis communication strategies at NASA during the Columbia and Challenger disasters with guest James Hartsfield.

Send us Fan Mail Columbia didn’t arrive when it was supposed to, and the whole world felt the silence. We sit down again with James Hartsfield, recently retired as director of communications at NASA’s Johnson Space Center, to walk through the most difficult minutes and hours after the Space Shuttle Columbia disaster and what crisis leadership looks like when every word carries consequence. He also looked back at the space shuttle Challenger response, and shares his thoughts on how differentl...

People in this episode

Host: Tom

Guest: James Hartsfield

Topics covered

• crisis communication
• NASA
• leadership
• space disasters
• Challenger
• Columbia

Keywords

• crisis communication
• NASA
• Columbia disaster
• Challenger disaster
• leadership
• space shuttle

Mentioned in this episode

Organizations: NASA

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