back to article 30 years on from Challenger, NASA remembers the fallen

On the clear and cold morning of January 28, 1986, the space shuttle Challenger lifted off from Cape Canaveral bearing seven crew. Minutes later they were all dead, and NASA is holding an official day of remembrance for them, and the crews of Apollo 1 and Shuttle Columbia. "Every year at this time, we take a moment to reflect …

  1. EddieD

    Kennedy moment.

    I can remember exactly where I was when I saw the news that Challenger had been lost - and who I was with.

    I'm glad about that - it shows that exploration of space is remarkably safe, indeed, it may be said to be boring. OTOH, I wonder if we took more risks - strides, not baby steps - whether we'd be further on in our colonisation of the final frontier.

    1. Gene Cash Silver badge

      Re: Kennedy moment.

      > it shows that exploration of space is remarkably safe, indeed, it may be said to be boring

      No, it shows NASA is terrified of taking risks, to the point that it retires a valuable and unique national asset (the Shuttles) without any backup plan.

      We haven't lost anyone because a lot of very smart people sweat all the details, make sure the backups work, and try to think of all the situations that could happen, and what you'd do to stay alive.

      Space exploration takes money, and NASA is not willing to fight for it, nor is it willing to propose anything risky. NASA's even admitted SLS doesn't really have a mission.

      1. Rik Myslewski

        Re: Kennedy moment.

        @Gene Cash — You are, I can only assume, being facetious when you say "NASA is not willing to fight for it" in regard to funding. NASA has been fighting the good fight for decades now, trying to squeeze pennies, nickels, and dimes out of it recalcitrant Congress – which only become more difficult after the Republicans took control.

        Don't blame NASA for underfunding, blame your congressional representatives.

      2. Pascal Monett Silver badge

        Re: NASA is terrified of taking risks

        And well it should be. You do not roll the dice on the lives of people that go beyond the atmosphere, alone and without even the possibility of help. If you're sending them that far away, you make damn sure that they can come back, that everything has been foreseen and accounted for, and that a working, dependable procedure is in place in every case.

        And when they do come back, you go over every bit of data with a fine-tooth comb to make sure that nothing unforeseen happened - whether or not the result was successful. You do so to ensure that, the next time, the crew will have 100% of the information they need, and 100% of the available chances of survival.

        It's called doing things right, and when people's lives are on the line, you don't do it any other way. When that is not done properly is when things like Challenger happen. Apparently you'd want that to happen more often. Well I don't. The Shuttle fleet was end-of-life, continuing to use them would have been criminal. The absence of replacement is Congress' fault, not NASA. Go blame them.

        1. Anonymous Coward
          Anonymous Coward

          Re: NASA is terrified of taking risks

          NASA took huge, calculated risks with the Apollo program. It paid off hugely.

          What you shouldn't do it take risks blindly. Exactly what the one(s) who approved to launch the Challenger that day took. It was all about just saving money, and probably keep media happy, without the proper technical knowledge. The classic recispe for disaster, and disaster happened.

          Apollo people took risks knowing far better what they were doing.

    2. Old Yank

      Re: Kennedy moment.

      I was a relatively new flight student at St Petersburg, Florida International Airport. St Pete/Clearwater was also the home of the Coast Guard HC-130 Search and Rescue Fleet. On that morning, I was doing "hood work", practicing simulated instrument landings while wearing a fogged visor that restricts vision beyond the instrument panel. On my last approach, about a quarter mile from the end of the runway, the controller suddenly broke in on the radio and commanded all aircraft in the pattern or vicinity to immediately exit the airspace and fly westward towards the Gulf of Mexico, VFR. His voice was a bit cracked, but he did not say why we were be diverted. As I reconfigured the aircraft for the aborted landing and began to climb, my instructor pushed my visor back and pointed over my shoulder to the eastern horizon.

      I looked on with awe at a white Y-shaped contrail gleaming against a perfectly blue winter morning sky, with no understanding of what it was at first. Then, it occurred to me that the tips of the Y were orange with flame, and a sickening feeling began to wash over me as I realized what had just happened. Heading out over the beach, the approach controller started issuing a flurry of instructions for the half-dozen or so aircraft, including us, to contact Tampa for further vectors. Almost as soon as he completed his transmission, we saw the big hulking HC-130s rolling down the taxi ways and then taking off towards the east. When we switch the radio to Tampa Terminal Control, the controller explained very abruptly, "The shuttle has just exploded, we need to keep the airspace open for CG SAR, please advise on your alternate destination north or south of PIE (the airport code for St Pete)."

      We flew solemnly to a small airstrip north of Tampa and landed on the lonely little private field. As I cleared the taxiway and parked, I was overcome with the sadness of it. My wife was in her primary education internship, and I thought about the optimism of a mission intended to bring the wonders of space flight down to school children, from the voice of a kind teacher. I will never forget the faces of the children, or the parents and teachers watching the launch at KSC, broadcast later that evening.

  2. spudmasterflex

    Sadness on another level

    I remember watching this a kid on the TV when it exploded, just recently I caught a documentary of unseen footage, even now it fills me with horror watching it explode.

    1. Kurt S

      Re: Sadness on another level

      I was 8 then, I will never forget those images.

  3. Zog_but_not_the_first
    Thumb Down

    "Killing season"?

    A bit of respect please.

    1. BillG
      Thumb Down

      Re: "Killing season"?

      I also feel "killing season" is very very disrespectful because "kill" implies intent and "season" implies sport.

      1. Anonymous Coward
        Anonymous Coward

        Re: "Killing season"?

        In some ways they were "killed". Both Shuttle disasters didn't happened by pure chance, but by people downplaying known issues for fear of having to spend more money to fix them.

    2. Martin Summers Silver badge

      Re: "Killing season"?

      I was about to comment on this too. It is not only disrespectful but trivialises the whole thing. I really think this sub heading should be changed.

      1. Simon Brady

        Re: "Killing season"?

        Agreed. I appreciate a witty Reg subheading as much as the next reader, but this one was poorly chosen and detracts from the otherwise respectful tone of the article.

    3. This post has been deleted by its author

    4. John Doe 12

      Re: "Killing season"?

      No respect here I'm afraid. The Register is the Daily Mail of the I.T. world :-/

    5. Kurt Meyer

      Re: "Killing season"?

      Zog, I fully agree with you and BillG, Martin, and Simon. It IS a thoughtless sub-head. El Reg hasn't been in scintillating form of late with regard to sub headings.

  4. Alistair
    Windows

    Was a very long day for me.

    I got up early to get to work early so I could take my lunch to watch the launch.

    Manager had no sense of people skills, was essentially an overblown secretary. Had fits when I said I was going to be late back to work. Mind you I did get back to work and finished the day. Owner of the company (a neighbour of mine) was astonished to see me in that afternoon. He knew how invested I was in geeky stuff (which was one of the reasons I was running their computers).

    I for one will not forget that image........

    1. BillG
      Mushroom

      Re: Was a very long day for me.

      I remember I was two years out of college working as a EE for a contractor that had equipment on the shuttle, although I was not on that project. I saw the explosion when I was home for lunch. I immediately drove back to the office.

      We were all told to stand by in case NASA needed our assistance in regards to our equipment. As EEs we were all walking around like zombies, in total shock. It would have been a mixed honor to assist in the investigation, but no request from NASA came to our department that day.

      I reminded myself why I wanted to be an Electrical Engineer in the first place - I wanted to create, to build, to make a difference. NASA was the epitome of why I studied all those years. When the word came out that the disaster occurred because a non-engineer manager had overridden the techies that were yelling DON'T LAUNCH, it impressed in me a distrust of non-engineering management that exists to this day.

      1. Anonymous Coward
        Anonymous Coward

        Re: Was a very long day for me.

        I was doing the usual morning backups, since 5 Hawaiian time, and poked my head out to watch the launch with my civilian counterpart. Worst day ever, even cleaning the bilges couldn't hold a candle to it. To later find out the details behind it enraged this engineer.

        I've watched NASA and, sorry, they haven't changed a bit. Even worse, actually.

        1. Dave 126 Silver badge

          Re: Was a very long day for me.

          >I've watched NASA and, sorry, they haven't changed a bit. Even worse, actually.

          That's as maybe, but they're not putting people into orbit any more.

          1. Jedit Silver badge
            Pint

            "That's as maybe, but they're not putting people into orbit any more"

            So he's right, NASA haven't changed a bit. They weren't putting people into orbit thirty years ago, either.

            Beer: to the crew of the Challenger and especially to Christa McAuliffe, the woman who wanted to teach history and instead became it.

  5. Atrophic Cerebrum

    Damn...

    I'm old and young at the same time, I remember John Craven on Newsround and this. May we reflect upon these people and may they rest in peace. Columbian Endeavour for the Discovery of Atlantis.

    1. Uncle Slacky Silver badge

      Re: Damn...

      I think most of us in the UK saw it first on Newsround - probably the only significant breaking story they ever covered. I think they had intended to cover the launch anyway because of the "first teacher in space" thing, and shuttle launches were no longer considered newsworthy by the major agencies, so they pretty much had an (unwanted) exclusive in the UK.

  6. This post has been deleted by its author

  7. Mike Banahan

    Time for an update

    On where the senior managers who made the launch decision for Challenger are now, after overruling the engineering advice.

    What are the odds that they never worked again / were promoted sideways / didn't miss a beat in their career progression?

  8. Fred Flintstone Gold badge

    I salute them

    Whatever way you look at it, the people who go up there are still pretty much pioneers.

    As an avid SF reader it sometimes takes a moment of mentally stepping back to realise how much at the very beginning of space exploration we still stand, how much effort it takes to get off this planet and just how fragile we really are.

    My respect to all of them, those past, those lost and those now active.

  9. stucs201

    Since Ron McNair never got to play it where he should have...

    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-TkFCkHsvIM

  10. Anonymous Coward
    Unhappy

    I remember Challenger...

    But Apollo 1 was the saddest event. One of the original Mercury astronauts plus two others being killed in a routine test that was not safe because NASA tested with pure oxygen pressurized to be proportional to the internal atmosphere of the capsule compared to the vacuum of space.

    At sea level that worked out to be about 20 PSI of pure oxygen versus the normal atmospheric pressure outside. At that pressure of pure oxygen, all that was needed was a spark from an electrical short and a lot of now-flammable Velcro and nylon webbing placed around the capsule to hold this and that, and the result was a gutted command capsule.

    RIP and much respect to the crews of Apollo 1 and the space shuttles Challenger and Columbia.

    1. Gene Cash Silver badge

      Re: I remember Challenger...

      > But Apollo 1 was the saddest event. One of the original Mercury astronauts

      Yes, and Deke Slayton held Grissom in such high regard that he was Slayton's choice for first man on the Moon. After that, Armstrong was just luck of the crew rotation.

      I always wonder how/if things would be different if we hadn't had such a shutmouthed introverted first-man-on-the-Moon... Armstrong basically did his best to vanish.

      I really wish Buzz Aldrin had been "first out the gate" as he would have been far more public and outspoken.

      1. Dave 126 Silver badge

        Re: I remember Challenger...

        >I really wish Buzz Aldrin had been "first out the gate" as he would have been far more public and outspoken.

        That was exactly the reason the mission planners chose Armstrong over Aldrin. They considered Aldrin a hothead.

        http://www.abc.net.au/radionational/programs/bigideas/why-neil-armstrong/6362508 ( mp3 download )

        Highlights of Why Neil Armstrong ? presented by the Space association of Australia and the Royal Aeronautical society. RMIT 24th March 2015

        James Hansen, Armstrong's official biographer, untangles some of the facts from the fiction and looks in great detail at the events and circumstances that led to Armstrong being remembered as the first man on the moon.

  11. Bubba Von Braun

    If you want to truth..

    It was NASA/Thiokol's arrogance that killed the seven astronauts. STS-51L is a study in how not to make critical decisions.

    It shows clearly the sort of corporate bullying that occurs when engineers/technicians say this is unwise or unsafe and then overrule the concern only to have the whole thing blow up. How many of you have had that situation in IT hang the consequences I needs this done now.. or don't worry about security, privacy doesn't matter anymore.

    So yes killed is a strong word, but to belittle it as an accident, doesn't do the loss of seven fine astronauts justice, the Rogers commission showed willful intent by some folks in the launch decision.

    An interesting read is "Truth, Lies and O-Rings" written by Alan J. McDonald look it and him up.. and it will give you an insight to what transpired both on the evening prior to the launch and the weeks that followed.

    1. a_yank_lurker

      Re: If you want to truth..

      If I remember correctly, the real problem was NASA was hungry for a publicity coup that they overrode the objections of the engineers including some from Morton Thiokol and NASA's own policies. It was known at the time the temperature was too low for a safe launch. So basically so ignorant history major/politician overrode the engineers for a PR stunt. This was the flight with the school teacher in space.

    2. IT Hack

      Re: If you want to truth..

      Boils down to this -

      Killed by management.

  12. John Smith 19 Gold badge
    Unhappy

    I would suggest it is the *second* worst space disaster in NASA's history.

    You'd think after that there could never be another Shuttle accident.

    Yet in 2003 they did it all over again.*

    *Although in fact a study by The Aerospace Corp reckoned NASA would lose 3 of it's 4 Shuttles eventually.

  13. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    RIP the few -a testament to pioneer spirit.

    - hopefully this is an appropriate place to also remember the late, great Richard Feynman; whose scientific rigour helped avoid a cover-up when the investigation took place.

    1. Dave 126 Silver badge

      Re: RIP the few -a testament to pioneer spirit.

      It turned out Mr Feynman wasn't joking.

  14. Yugguy

    They were not unconscious

    They would have been conscious for several minutes as the crew compartment plummeted. NASA did not want this version going public in the immediate aftermath of this.

    1. Anonymous Coward
      Anonymous Coward

      Re: They were not unconscious

      Maybe this isn't the most appropriate place for such a comment - true or not ?

      1. Anonymous Coward
        Anonymous Coward

        Re: They were not unconscious

        It is true. The crew probably survived the initial explosion, and the G-forces of being hurled away. Switches on the dashboard were flipped, indicating that pilot Smith made a futile effort to restore power to the crew cabin. The cabin didn't buckle, so investigators suspect it maintained pressure and the crew stayed conscious.

        The appropriateness or not of saying so here is debatable, given that it was concerns about public image that lead to the flight not being postponed in the first place.

        Whilst the massaging of information immediately after the even can be considered a kind act towards the families of these good people, after thirty years they will have already been made aware of the investigators' findings.

  15. TRT Silver badge

    I remember that day...

    I had been woken up early because my grandmother had died overnight. My mother had phoned in to the college and I'd been granted a leave of absence. Then, at about midday, the news came in from my other grandmother's house. My cat of seven years, whom she had been looking after whilst we were having building work done, had also died.

    "What a shitty day," I thought as I sat down to watch the NewsRound special. "How could this day get any worse?"

    It did.

    I was a 17 year old studying science A-levels. I'd collected the whole of Insight, a magazine / encyclopaedia of science in weekly parts with binders, which I read with my father as I grew up, and was filled with the promises of reusable space exploration vehicles; I'd studied the cut-away diagrams of the STS craft and their launchers; I'd stood as close as it was allowed to the giant rocket assembly hangars in Florida; I was a great fan of Dr Who and Blake's 7, with their visions of cities in space and regular off-planet living; I'd stood on the roof of Manchester Airport's terminal building as the 747 carrying a shuttle had overflown the UK that time.

    My jaw dropped as the vapour trail rising into the sky unexpectedly split, then mushroomed. A brief flash and the camera changed to a wobbly extreme tele-photo lens. Debris was spreading out and down from the inside of a cloud. I was overtaken by an almost maniacal laughter as the words of the launch controller permeated my cortex.

    "We appear to have a major malfunction".

    Malfunction? That has to be the understatement of the century.

    Then shock, disbelief, rapt fascination, spilt tea.

    Then the soothing voice of John Craven, usually so level, a hint of alarm edging his voice. My recall will not be 100%, but it was along the lines of...

    "Well, we're going to stay with Cape Canaveral for a while. It appears as though there's been a problem with the launch."

    The rest of the evening was just a blur. Analysis, shock, reaction, more analysis, waiting for news of survivors, politicians making speeches, speculative analysis, experts wheeled out, financial analysts making predictions about the future of the space programme which was, for me, the future of mankind.

    Every year on this day, I ring my father. I never tell him why. It's because he lost his mother. I'm sure he knows that's why, but he'd never say. Maybe he's not noticed. It's a date etched on my memory, though.

  16. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    I was at Poly (Thames) ...

    in the second year of a Computer & Communications Systems degree. It was axiomatic that the launch was of interest to us geeks, and totally numbing to see it unfold before our eyes.

    Now, as then, I'm sure we felt the mixed emotions of shock, sorrow, disbelief - the bad things. But somehow not only balanced, but trumped by the feelings of pride, inspiration, hope, respect, and all the best in mankind the space race has fostered.

    And despite what you may have thought about Reagan, it's hard not to admire his eulogy - I dread to think what bland phrases todays spinmeisters would come up with.

  17. steamrunner

    Another memory

    Like many here, I remember this well. I remember seeing the images on television and was very shocked. I was 17 at the time. I had a large diagram/cutaway type poster on my bedroom wall of the shuttle which also listed each of the orbiters by name and number, and I very clearly recall finding a small pencil and rather emotionally writing the date next to the name "Challenger"...

  18. PassiveSmoking

    All failures of management

    Aside from all happening in the winter, NASA's three big failures all have something else in common, fundamentally they were all failures of management.

    Apollo 1 happened because NASA management let quality control and oversight slip and put the schedule ahead of everything else. This resulted in North American delivering the block 1 Apollos in such a shoddy state that they were basically death traps.

    Challenger's management failures are already well understood and are used to this day as a case study in how not to manage high risk projects. Management had ridiculously optimistic estimates of the risk of operating a shuttle which, as Richard Feynman noted, would mean that you could launch a shuttle daily for 300 years and expect not to have an accident if true, a figure that was blatantly ridiculous to even the rankest layman and which flew in the face of NASA's own engineers who put the risk of failure at 1 in 200 (which while still optimistic as it turned out, was far closer to reality than Management's figure). It seems they were in the habit of minimising risks and ignoring engineers and when the engineers raised concerns over the Challenger flight they were ignored once again, but this round of Russian Roulette was one round too many.

    It's disheartening to know that Management made almost the same mistakes with the Columbia disaster. Once again, Management started minimising known risks for the sake of the schedule, ignoring repeated incidents where the heat shield was damaged by shedding tank foam, treating the incidents as annoyances rather than life-threatening events. Once again, engineers raised concerns that the heat shield had been damaged and wanted to plan some contingencies, and again they were ignored. And while a rescue was unlikely there could have been options if only the engineers had been allowed to formulate and execute a rescue mission of some sort.

    On the other hand, arguably NASA's biggest success, the safe return of the Apollo 13 crew, was largely down to superlatively good management. Managers and engineers pulled together and worked through the problems one by one and the end result was three exhausted and traumatised, but alive, astronauts standing on the deck of the USS Iowa Jima.

    NASA needs to learn the lessons all of these events have to teach and learn them properly. Until they do they'll simply be waiting for the next disaster.

    1. allthecoolshortnamesweretaken

      Re: All failures of management

      Yeah, well, guys like Gene Kranz aren't always in charge when they should be.

      1. PassiveSmoking

        Re: All failures of management

        Kranz ran a tight ship, for sure.

  19. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    Apollo 13 ..

    Didn't Lovell describe it as a "successful failure".

    Either way, if you ever get involved in discussions about "team building", this is the movie to put on. It really shows what teamwork is about.

  20. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    Has there been comparable Russian space disasters? it seems to me that they don't have as many.

    This is probably down to a lack of cost cutting and not reusing craft.

    1. Chris Beattie

      Comparable to Apollo 1, yes. The one I can think off off the top of my head was Soyuz 11 (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Soyuz_11). Comparable to the shuttle disasters, though, I don't think so. I can't think of any Russian craft that could carry more than three people except Buran, whose sole orbital flight was uncrewed.

      I would not be surprised if there were more, but the Cold War-era Soviets were especially tight-lipped regarding failures.

      1. allthecoolshortnamesweretaken

        AFAIK, 4 cosmonauts died on a mission:

        Sojus 1, 1967 - parachute failed during landing phase. Wladimir Komarow

        Sojus 11, 1971 - after a stay at the Saljut-1 space station, on the return trip a valve malfunctioned and the capsule lost pressure. Crew were not wearing pressure suits due to limited room in capsule (3 men without suits could fit into a craft originally designed for 2 men wearing suits. Barely.). Georgi Dobrowolski, Wladislaw Wolkow, Wiktor Pazajew

        ----

        Sojus 18-1 (or Sojus 18A) was supposed to go to Saljut-4 in 1975, but stage 2 failed to separate properly from stage 3. Stage 3 ignited and tore away from stage 2, but all vectors were wrong, so the safety automatic initiated abort and successful emergency landing - way off, almost in China, but as they say: any landing you can walk away from, etc. Wassili Grigorjewitsch Lasarew, Oleg Grigorjewitsch Makarow

        Sojus T-10-1 actually blew up on the launch pad on 1983-09-26, but the crew was saved by the emergency rocket. Duration of flight 5 Min 13 Sec. Wladimir Georgjewitsch Titow and Gennadi Michailowitsch Strekalow had to endure between 14 and 17 G, but lived to tell the tale.

  21. cray74

    Challenger

    Space Coast schools let kids out into their yards to watch shuttle launches, so I watched Challenger's launch from outside my fifth grade classroom.

    My family had just moved into a new home, our big color TV hadn't been delivered by the movers yet, and it was cold by Floridian standards (a centimeter of ice on the drainage canal near us). So we'd eat breakfast and dinner in front of the fireplace and watch the ongoing investigation on a little black-and-white portable TV. When they got to the conclusion it was the weather that had caused the SRB's seals to fail, the memory was sort of burned in with the cold.

    The cold spells of the mid-1980s also gutted the Floridian citrus industry, so for years afterward I'd pass abandoned, overgrown orange groves and end up thinking of the Challenger again.

POST COMMENT House rules

Not a member of The Register? Create a new account here.

  • Enter your comment

  • Add an icon

Anonymous cowards cannot choose their icon

Other stories you might like