Greeting every visitor to the ‘Remembering Columbia’ Museum is a profound story about the STS-107 tragedy.
Three verses from scripture, Joshua 1: 6-9, are etched in stone at the entrance:
“Be strong and steadfast, so that you may give this people possession of the land I swore to their ancestors that I would give them. 7 Only be strong and steadfast, being careful to observe the entire law which Moses my servant enjoined on you. Do not swerve from it either to the right or to the left, that you may succeed wherever you go. 8 Do not let this book of the law depart from your lips. Recite it by day and by night, that you may carefully observe all that is written in it; then you will attain your goal; then you will succeed. 9 I command you: be strong and steadfast! Do not fear nor be dismayed, for the LORD, your God, is with you wherever you go.”
The day after the Shuttle broke apart, Brother Fred Raney from First Baptist Church of Hemphill read the passage to a crowd of searchers. Each time searchers located the remains of one of Columbia’s crew members, a prayer service led by Brother Raney began with those same verses. “I’ve told people. I’ve told family members of the astronauts that I had the privilege of visiting with, it was really a chapel in the woods because of the reverence that was there,” Raney said.
Marsha Cooper, a safety officer with the National Forest Service, was one of the thousands of volunteers who showed up to aid in the recovery of more than 80,000 pieces of the Space Shuttle. She was one of the first to learn of the scripture’s significance. “Mark Kelley, the astronaut, walked up to Brother Fred and said, ‘Did you know that Rick Husband read that scripture to them before they lifted off?’ ” The night before the launch, the crew’s families gathered for a final supper together. Commander Rick Husband quoted those verses from memory. “Was it a coincidence,” Cooper asked. “I believe in God, so I think it was God that worked that out.”
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Patricia Huffman Smith NASA Museum 'Remembering Columbia' 