Challenger Disaster In 1986

Through My Eyes: Waxing Nostalgic for NASA

It proved to be the latter when the very next year Project Mercury, the first human space flight program, revealed the names of its seven astronauts. Astronauts! That was a new word for our dictionaries. Many of us were curious to learn about their training and what it entailed. Some documentaries filmed the exceedingly rigorous exercises by which the weaker individuals were weeded out and new skills were taught to the stronger men. I was horrified to hear of the vehicle they termed the “vomit comet.” My sister and her family lived in Seabrook, Texas. The office and communication complex for NASA was just outside of town and only about 20 minutes from their house. It was considered to be Houston based. That’s why the messages were directed to that name as in, “Houston, we have a problem.”  There were astronauts living in their neighborhood and everything about them and their families was big news. A TV crew had built a tower outside one man’s house so they could film the coming and going of the family. When my husband and children and I went to visit my sister Linda we learned their vicinity was in the national news constantly. We attended their church and the lay reader was in the NASA program. A couple out strolling dropped by their house to show the dog Linda had given them as a puppy. Linda asked for an autograph from the astronaut for our son David. His face lit up with excitement. I think he still has it after all these years. Were you glued to your TV in July of 1969 to see the first steps taken by man on the surface of the moon? Beside the fact that we got there, we were just as startled by the fact that it was televised for us to see on earth. I was so excited I could not sit down but kept walking back and forth in front of the TV. That was a super exciting time for our country and, indeed, the whole world. While our attention has been focused on the manned flights, NASA has made great strides in exploring our universe with unmanned craft. Begun in 1977, Voyagers I and II will become the first objects built by humans to exit our solar system possibly as soon as 2015. The Hubble Space Telescope has found planets outside our solar system and helped to pinpoint the age of the universe. Two Mars rover crafts which were designed to last only three months have been sending back important data for seven years.

Last Flight of Space Shuttle Challenger, Watch Detailed ...

I will never forget where I was on the morning of January 28, 1986 at 11:38am. I was only 7 years old. I remember that the earlier weeks before the Space Shuttle Challenger disaster, my class was studying space for this spectacular event and we colored Space Shuttle pictures in celebration. in the days before I had heard a lot about the mission from school and my parents but I still had know understanding of the history about to take place. In fact, I never knew the importance of the National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA) until that year just because of the up and coming launch.

I was totally fascinated with one of the crew members, the school teacher, Christa McAuliffe . I had heard from my teacher how she was the first member of the "Teacher In Space Project" and first civilian to go on a space mission.  Back then women didn't participate in too many aviation missions so my teacher had me highly ecstatic about viewing this particular launch. It made me feel good to see a woman making history live. Another crew member aboard the Space Shuttle Challenger who was making history that day was, Ellison Shoji Onizuka . He was the first Asian American to reach space. Many viewed the launch live because of the presence of history being made with the crew, including thousands of classes in various schools all over the world. With my class included, we too gathered to watch never knowing at all what was about to take place before our little eyes. Along with millions of viewers, we all watched in horror as the Space Shuttle Challenger went up as planned and then suddenly disintegrated without warning after launching from Kennedy Space Center. The tragedy happened approximately 73 seconds after take-off.

It was later discovered by the Rogers Commission (a special commission appointed by the US President at the time, Ronald Reagan to investigate the accident) that the design of the SRBs contained a potentially catastrophic flaw in the O-rings since 1977, but they failed to address it properly. They also disregarded warnings from engineers about the dangers of launching posed by the low temperatures of that morning. They had failed to adequately report these technical concerns to their superiors resulting in this devastating tragedy. The spacecraft disintegrated over the Atlantic Ocean, off the coast of central Florida at 11:38 a.m in front of thousands of anxious onlookers.

National reporting, 1941-1986, from labor conflicts to the Challenger disaster

CHALLENGER EXPLOSION REMAINS UNSOLVED ... 46.672, February 1, 1986, p. 1, col. 6 ; p. 10, cols. 4 - 5; reprinted by permission of the New York Times Co., ...

The Space Shuttle Challenger Disaster of January 28, 1986

Creative organization theory, a resourcebook

41 The Challenger Disaster: A Case of Discouraged Feedback? ... power politics, and misinformation systems that lay behind the disaster on 28 January 1986. ...

Engineering project management, the IPQMS method and case histories

9.1 THE SPACECRAFT CHALLENGER DISASTER JANUARY 28, 1986 The Space Shuttle Challenger exploded 73.213 seconds into launch January 28, 1986, ...

About to Die, How News Images Move the Public

Even in coverage there were similarities, as when Shales's column recycled ideas from the column he wrote following the Challenger disaster in 1986. 130. ...