Reagan Names Own Board to Probe Shuttle Disaster : NASA Panel Will Go Out of Business

WASHINGTON —  President Reagan today named former Secretary of State William P. Rogers and former astronaut Neil Armstrong to head an independent board to determine what caused last week’s space shuttle catastrophe that killed seven astronauts.

Reagan said the presidential commission on the shuttle accident will have 120 days to find out “how it happened and how it can be prevented from happening again.”

An interim NASA board set up to investigate will no longer exist, White House spokesman Larry Speakes said.

In a brief announcement at the White House, Reagan said Rogers, who served as secretary of state during the Nixon Administration, and Armstrong, the first man to walk on the moon, will serve as chairman and vice chairman of the panel, which will have at least 10 other members, including Chuck Yeager, the test pilot who was the first to break the sound barrier, and shuttle astronaut Sally Ride, the first American woman in space.

Finding Out How

Reagan, appearing with Rogers, Armstrong and NASA chief William Graham, noted: “It’s been almost a week since our nation and family stood together as we watched Challenger slip beyond our grasp. . . . As we move away from that terrible day, we must devote our energies to finding out how it happened and how it can be prevented from happening again.”

Of the seven dead astronauts, Reagan said:

“We owe it to them to conduct this investigation so that future space travelers can approach the conquest of space with confidence and America can go forward with enthusiasm and optimism that has sparked and marked all of our great undertakings.”

Although NASA set up its own interim board immediately after the accident last Tuesday, Reagan has been under pressure from Congress to appoint an independent panel that would not have to answer to the space agency.

Quick Meeting

Rogers told reporters he will convene a meeting of the panel as quickly as possible and said he did not anticipate any problem in obtaining any information it needs to conduct its probe.

He said the commission will not be totally dependent on NASA for its work but said it will not set out to be critical of the space agency, which he said has “done an excellent job.”

“It’s essential that the work of this commission be thorough,” Rogers said, adding that he does not consider the finding over the weekend of a “hot spot” on one of the solid booster rockets as conclusive of the cause.

Speakes said it will be up to Rogers to determine whether interim reports to Reagan will be made public and whether any of its deliberations will be open.

May Have 20 Members

Also named to the panel, which may eventually have up to 20 members, were:

--Albert Wheelon, a physicist and member of the President’s Foreign Intelligence Advisory Board who serves as a senior vice president of the Hughes Aircraft Co.’s space and communications group.

--Former TWA Vice President Robert Rummel, an aerospace engineer who now heads his own firm in Mesa, Ariz.

--Arthur Walker Jr., professor of applied physics at Stanford University.

--Richard Feynman, Nobel laureate and professor of theoretical physics at Caltech.

--Eugene Covert, professor of aeronautics at Massachusetts Institute of Technology and a consultant to NASA on rocket engines.

--Robert Hotz, former editor of Aviation Week and Space Technology.

--David Acheson, former senior vice president and general counsel of Communications Satellite Corp. and now a partner in a Washington law firm.

--Air Force Maj. Gen. Donald Kutyna, a former manager of the Pentagon’s space shuttle program.

All will serve without pay.