scope:

Description of Driving Event:

Early on Saturday, April 21, 2001, a pipe in the secondary water system failed in the basement of Buidling 8 at the NASA Goddard Space Flight Center. The primary asset damaged by the resulting flood was the NASA photo archive, located immediately below the location where the pipe failed. The photo archive is the property of NASA Headquarters and is administered by Goddard. It includes mostly duplicate negatives, transparencies, and photographs, but also does contain some original material. The investigation revealed that there was no document describing any agreement between HQ and Goddard concerning the conditions, duration, or expectations between the two parties regarding storage of the archives.