Challenger: 25 years later, a still painful wound

[catlover79]

http://www.google.com/hostednews/ap/...7fecf987241e7e

CAPE CANAVERAL, Fla. (AP) — For many, no single word evokes as much pain.

Challenger.

A quarter-century later, images of the exploding space shuttle still signify all that can go wrong with technology and the sharpest minds. The accident on Jan. 28, 1986 — a scant 73 seconds into flight, nine miles above the Atlantic for all to see — remains NASA's most visible failure.

It was the world's first high-tech catastrophe to unfold on live TV. Adding to the anguish was the young audience: School children everywhere tuned in that morning to watch the launch of the first schoolteacher and ordinary citizen bound for space, Christa McAuliffe.

She never made it.

McAuliffe and six others on board perished as the cameras rolled, victims of stiff O-ring seals and feeble bureaucratic decisions.

It was, as one grief and trauma expert recalls, "the beginning of the age when the whole world knew what happened as it happened."

"That was kind of our pilot study for all the rest to come, I think. It was so ghastly," said Sally Karioth, a professor in Florida State University's school of nursing.

The crew compartment shot out of the fireball, intact, and continued upward another three miles before plummeting. The free fall lasted more than two minutes. There was no parachute to slow the descent, no escape system whatsoever; NASA had skipped all that in shuttle development. Space travel was considered so ordinary, in fact, that the Challenger seven wore little more than blue coveralls and skimpy motorcycle-type helmets for takeoff.

In a horrific flash, the most diverse space crew ever — including one black, one Japanese-American and two women, one of them a Jew — was gone. The name of NASA's second oldest shuttle was forever locked in a where-were-you moment.

"You say 'Challenger' and then we see that figure of smoke in the sky," said Karioth, who teaches death and dying classes.

There has been a growing list of calamities since then.

Waco. Oklahoma City. Columbine. 9/11. Shuttle Columbia. Katrina. Virginia Tech. And now, Tucson.

With so much carnage, another space catastrophe wouldn't have the same impact as Challenger, Karioth noted. "We're used to everybody dying now," she said.

The death of a young, vivacious schoolteacher, combined with NASA's stubborn refusal to share information about the accident and the realization that America's space program was fallible, added to the nation's collective pain.

President Ronald Reagan's poetic tribute soothed the day's raw emotions.

"The crew of the space shuttle Challenger honored us by the manner in which they lived their lives," Reagan told a grieving nation after canceling that night's State of the Union address. "We will never forget them, nor the last time we saw them, this morning, as they prepared for their journey and waved goodbye and 'slipped the surly bonds of Earth' to 'touch the face of God.'"

NASA safely had launched shuttles 24 times before, and a sense of routine and hurry-it-up had crept in. The space agency wanted to pull off 15 missions in 1986. Repeated delays with Columbia on that year's first flight and then with Challenger were spoiling the effort.

The first federal Martin Luther King holiday had just been observed. NASA's Voyager 2 probe, flying farther than any previous spacecraft, had swung past Uranus, discovering 10 new moons. "That's What Friends Are For," the AIDS charity anthem, topped the music charts. And a 37-year-old schoolteacher from Concord, N.H., was about to rocket into orbit.

"Imagine a history teacher making history," McAuliffe observed before the flight. She got an apple from a technician atop the ice-encrusted launch pad, before boarding Challenger one final time.

In the 20s at daybreak, the temperature had risen only into the mid-30s by the time Challenger blasted off at 11:38 a.m. "Go at throttle up," radioed commander Francis "Dick" Scobee.

What happened next was unthinkable, his widow says.

"It was really a shock wave that went across our country and around the world," June Scobee Rodgers said in an interview this week with The Associated Press. "People witnessed the loss of Challenger over and over on their televisions."

Dick Scobee. Michael Smith. Ellison Onizuka. Judith Resnik. Ronald McNair. Christa McAuliffe. Gregory Jarvis. The first of the shuttle astronauts to die on the job.

Seventeen years later, almost to the day, seven more astronauts were killed, this time at the end of their mission. Instead of booster rockets and freezing launch weather, fuel-tank foam insulation was to blame. The similarities between Challenger and Columbia, though, were haunting. Another multiethnic crew lost, more poor decision-making, an intolerant work culture, drum-beating pressure to launch.

This week, as NASA observes the 25th anniversary of the Challenger disaster, the shuttle fleet is grounded once more. Fuel tank cracking is the latest culprit.

NASA hopes to get Discovery flying by the end of February. Endeavour — Challenger's replacement — will follow in April. It will fly with or without commander Mark Kelly, who's tending to his wounded wife, Arizona Congresswoman Gabrielle Giffords, who was shot Jan. 8 in Tucson. Atlantis will close out the 30-year shuttle program with a summertime flight, No. 135.

Shuttle program manager John Shannon prefers not "to compare and contrast" the Challenger era and now. But he points out that he's felt "zero pressure" to rush the remaining flights, even though "we kind of get beat up a little bit" in some quarters for all the delays.

Roger Launius, a senior curator at the National Air and Space Museum in Washington, says: "When we look back 50 years from now on the shuttle program, we are going to view it as this remarkable technological achievement. The one and only reusable human space vehicle in the world. And it had a remarkable run for 30 years. Some tragedies along the way, but enormous successes as well."

For their part, the families of the lost Challenger crew dwell on the good that came out of the accident: a network of education centers. The 48th Challenger Learning Center opens Friday in Louisville, Ky.

On Thursday, Steven J. McAuliffe, widower of Christa McAuliffe, said in a statement that remembrances by people across the country are "both comforting and inspirational to our family."

McAuliffe, a federal judge in Concord, N.H., said, "Christa confidently and joyfully embraced life, no less than her friends and colleagues on Challenger, and no less than the crews of Columbia, Apollo 1, and all of those people who courageously follow their own paths every day. I know Christa would say that that is the most precious lesson — ordinary people can make extraordinary contributions ..."

He said she would be especially pleased by the Challenger Center for Space Science Education. Dick Scobee's widow, June Rodgers, is an educator and founding board chairman of the center.

As she has on every Challenger anniversary, Rodgers will visit a learning center to watch the children in action. First, she will take part in NASA's public memorial service Friday morning at Kennedy Space Center, some 10 miles from Challenger's grave. The remains of the spacecraft — what was retrieved from the ocean — are buried in a pair of abandoned missile silos on Air Force property.

"I wonder if it's because the image is so ingrained in our brains, that it seems like yesterday," Rodgers said.

Almost as many years have passed since the accident, as the span of her 26-year marriage to Dick Scobee.

"Isn't it interesting about the number 25?" she asked softly. "Challenger was the 25th mission. This is 25 years."

A full generation has come and gone.

[MickeyMac]

I was in the 5th grade when that happened, and remember being at school around lunchtime when we got the news.


Sad tragedy indeed.

[catlover79]

I was in kindergarten then. In those days, my elementary school didn't have kindergartners attend all week. I attended half a day Monday, then all day on Tuesdays and Thursdays. Challenger was on a Tuesday, so I would've been in school. I don't think we watched it, or if we did, I don't remember. Maybe the older students in my school did, I don't know. In any case, just a sad, sad story - as it was for the Columbia crew, who went down 8 years ago Feb. 1. May God continue to bless the astronauts' families - and may their legacy continue to live on.

[Marvo301]

I remember that day vividly. I was still in bed sleeping in. My Mom came into my room and said did you hear that the space shuttle blew up? This shocked me into being wide awake. I jumped out of bed, got dressed, and went downstairs. There I sat down in front of the TV where I spend most of the day watching and rewatching the footage of the accident and watching all the news coverage of it. I remember feeling very sad and very empty inside. I couldn't believe that an accident like this could happen to NASA. Like millions of others I went into a state of shock and of mourning for the fallen heroes who made up the shuttle crew. I don't think i began to really deal with my feelings and emotions until hearing President Reagan's incredible speech about how the crew had "left the surly bonds of earth to touch the face of God". Today I honor the memories of the seven brave and heroic members of the Challenger crew and ask God to bless their loved ones on this difficult day.

[catlover79]

25 years ago tomorrow...I still can't believe it. The State of the Union address was scheduled for that night, but was postponed. That's when then-President Reagan addressed the nation. "To touch the face of God..." that phrase always makes me want to cry.

[Marvo301]

"They left the surly bonds of earth to touch the face of God" That sentence almost always make me cry. It takes me back to the emotion of that day and the days following. I will always be grateful to President Reagan for the remarkable leadership and deep compassion which he displayed at that time.

[browneyes106]

I was only around 10 months old when it happened. I remember my brothers saying that they watched it live on TV at school. RIP Challenger crew

[MrCleveland]

Not only that, but the 1st Asian American Ellison Onizuka was on the flight too.

I was only 3 when this happened, so I didn't remember....

[ZeldaGilroy]

This happened the day before my 10th birthday. I was in the 4th grade. I remember we came back from lunch and the teacher told us about it and she was crying. It had been such a huge deal and actually a well-loved and respected teacher from my district was a finalist to get to go, but was beat out by Christa McAuliffe and so it really hit home for all the teachers in my school and it just made it so hard for everyone. I specifically remember watching all the coverage on the news and just crying and crying to the point that my parents wouldn't let me read the paper or watch the news. It still makes sad as my eyes are tearing up now.

[catlover79]

I know that because of a teacher being on board, almost all the schools around the country had the TV on to watch the launch. I can only imagine how many people (especially kids) were traumatized by seeing that all unfold live. Awful and so, so sad.

[catlover79]

I just found this article. THIS is chilling:

http://www.aolnews.com/2011/01/27/ch...might-blow-up/

Christa McAuliffe Had No Fear Challenger Might 'Blow Up'

Jan 27, 2011 – 7:06 PM

Lee Speigel
Contributor

When Christa McAuliffe was chosen in 1985 as the first private citizen/teacher to fly in space on board a space shuttle, she couldn't have imagined the overwhelming impact her life and commitment to education would have on millions of students and other teachers around the world.

That impact occurred after she died with her astronaut crew mates when the space shuttle Challenger was destroyed just over a minute after it launched on Jan. 28, 1986.

Six months earlier, McAuliffe told me in an exclusive interview: "People really feel that space travel is safe now. It's not that earlier feeling that, oh, it's gonna blow up or something's gonna happen."

When Vice President George Bush announced that McAuliffe -– a social studies teacher -- had been NASA's unanimous choice over 11,000 applicants, it came as no surprise to her students and fellow teachers at Concord High School in Concord, N.H. (coincidentally, my high school in the town where I grew up).

McAuliffe had planned to teach lessons from orbit to schoolchildren around the world. Her "Classroom Earth" project had two main lessons: "The Ultimate Field Trip" and "Where We've Been, Where We're Going and Why?"

(Since McAuliffe never had the chance to present her Earth-orbit classroom, check out this video to see exactly what she planned for what has now become known as her "lost lessons.")

Because of our mutual connection to Concord High, it was a great honor for me to do a live radio interview with McAuliffe in July 1985 just before she was chosen to fly in space.

On July 12, 1985, she was at Mission Control at the Johnson Space Center in Houston with the nine other teacher candidates preparing to watch the launch of the space shuttle Challenger. Just seconds away from liftoff, an engine malfunction caused a computer to shut down the shuttle's engines.

Two days later, when I spoke with Christa, I asked if she had envisioned herself inside the Challenger when its launch was aborted.

"I think all of us were probably going through that, and as the countdown continued, from 10 seconds, everyone was getting very excited, and then we heard that the computer had pulled it.

"Two things flashed through my mind: One, how disappointed the people on board must feel, because since it was an engine problem, we knew that it wasn't something they were going to be able to do right away.

"But the second thing that went through my mind was I felt really good that the system works, and just the thought that if I was on that shuttle, and there were two cooling systems, and if one switch didn't go, I was real glad that the computer would be able to shut it down, and you'd be able to go in orbit with both systems working."

Our conversation moved into the area of the safety aspects of space flight, especially since she had just witnessed the Challenger shuttle malfunction. McAuliffe said something that at the time didn't put me on alert or seem like an out-of-the-ordinary statement. But later, after the tragic event of the deaths of the seven Challenger astronauts, her words suddenly seemed accidentally yet eerily prophetic:

"I had really never thought of the safety feature before. But people really feel that space travel is safe now. It's not that earlier feeling that, oh, it's gonna blow up or something's gonna happen. The shuttle is a really good, safe program, and it certainly was proven when it shut down again at Mission Control. Right at this point I feel that I'll be OK if I go up."

A week after she said that, McAuliffe was given the nod to become an astronaut, and six months later, she would board that same shuttle, the Challenger, and leave a legacy behind for space education that has enormous impact on students and teachers to this day.

In a statement released this week by her widower, Steven McAuliffe, a chief judge of the U.S. District Court in New Hampshire, he wrote: "I know Christa would say that this is the most precious lesson -– ordinary people can make extraordinary contributions when they remain true to themselves and enthusiastically pursue their own dreams wherever they may lead."

One of Christa McAuliffe's close friends was June Scobee Rodgers, whose husband, Dick Scobee, was the Challenger commander on that fateful flight.

Scobee Rodgers, also a teacher and author of "Silver Linings: My Life Before and After Challenger 7" (Smyth & Helwys Publishing), is the founding chairman of the board of the Challenger Center for Space Science Education. She brought the Challenger families together after the deaths of the astronauts to create the Challenger Center as a way of honoring their memory.

"I said, 'You know, we can't launch satellites, but can we continue the mission? The mission was so important, and the crew bonded and embraced Christa and called themselves the teacher-in-space mission, so could we continue that education mission?'

"The families selected me as their chairman and encouraged me to go off and do that, and they supported me and we joined in our efforts, but it took a great deal of strength to see it through," Scobee Rodgers told AOL News.

Now, 25 years later, through the inspiration of McAuliffe and her fellow astronauts, there are nearly 50 Challenger Centers in the United States and overseas, influencing millions of students and their teachers.

Steven McAuliffe says he and his family believe "Christa would be especially pleased by and proud of the Challenger Center for Space Science Education and its mission."

"Our family knows that generations of students and teachers will continue to share her love of learning and love of life, and will do great things for our world," he said.

[Family Ties Forever!]

I was in first grade when it happened. It was so sad. We watched it on tv in our classroom.

[Zoneboy]

Originally Posted by Marvo301

I remember that day vividly. I was still in bed sleeping in. My Mom came into my room and said did you hear that the space shuttle blew up? This shocked me into being wide awake. I jumped out of bed, got dressed, and went downstairs. There I sat down in front of the TV where I spend most of the day watching and rewatching the footage of the accident and watching all the news coverage of it.

That's how I remember it and almost to the exact detail. The only difference is that our home doesn't have stairs.

[spunkygirl]

I had just turned 11 when this happened. I remember watching it on tv and my mouth dropping open in shock as the shuttle blew up. I got sickened though by the jokes kids in school made about it

[catlover79]

^ Just sickening. Some kids can be so cruel.