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On January 28, 1986 the space shuttle Challenger went up
in smoke high in the sunny skies over Florida. Hours before that
on Cape Canaveral a closely-knit team of NASA scientists and engineers
were busy at work checking out for the umpteenth time the systems of the
doomed orbiter preparing for what seemed just another routine liftoff.
The seven-strong crew, among them Sharon Christa McAuliffe, a primary schoolteacher
selected from among thousands of applicants from the education profession
for entrance into the astronaut ranks - were receiving last minute instructions
and good wishes. There was an agitated crowd of media people and
onlookers thronging the launch area awaiting the fiery liftoff. None
of them could even imagine that minutes later the Challenger would blow
up in a giant orange-white fireball killing all the seven astronauts on
board and putting America’s entire space program on ice for a whole three
years.
What happened nine miles up in the sunlit Florida sky on
that cold freezing morning forever ended man’s nonchalance about space
flights…
It all began the night before when ground temperature at
Kennedy was down to minus 5 degrees Celsius (27 degrees Fahrenheit), the
coldest day NASA had ever launched a shuttle. In the morning a special
ice team got down to work looking for signs of ice formation that could
seriously compromise the orbiter’s heat-resistant plates. It later
transpired that a Rockwell engineer who was monitoring the launch from
California phoned in urging the flight control to delay the launch. Meanwhile,
the crowd gathered at Pad 39B at Kennedy enthusiastically welcomed
the astronauts heading for the waiting spacecraft, oblivious of the grim
warning made from about 3,000 miles away… Taking up their seats in the
cockpit, the astronauts ran a last minute computer check of the shuttle’s
systems. Everything looked all right for the mission that, among other
things was to put in orbit a 100 million dollar communications satellite.
Seven and a half minutes before the Challenger’s giant, billion
dollar engines roared into action, feeders were all disengaged. The shuttle’s
ten-story high fuel tank packed a staggering half million plus gallons
of liquid oxygen and hydrogen and the solid fuel in the two boosters weighed
more than a million pounds.
Moments later the giant spaceship roared off to enthusiastic
applause by dozens of thrilled onlookers, among them Christie McAuliffe’s
family and 18 third grade pupils who had traveled 15 hundred miles from
Concord, New Hampshire to see their teacher making history…
73 seconds into the flight Challenger was engulfed by gusts
of orange fire and exploded. When the terrible cloud disappeared, those
down below were too scared and shocked to say a word.
It’s hard to believe it, but in Houston, the official commentator
kept reading from the flight program, apparently oblivious of what was
really happening. To millions of stunned TV viewers his words sounded like
an incantation. Suddenly, the man fell silent and, a moment later, mumbled:
“We’ve just been told by mission coordinator that Orbiter Challenger has
blown up…”
President Ronald Reagan was devastated by the tragic news.
It was his decision to make a schoolteacher the first civilian to fly into
space. Christa McAuliffe had been selected from among more than 11,000
fellow teachers vying for the honor. In a nationally televised appearance
made a few hours later, the President tried his best to comfort his tragedy-stricken
country folk…
The Americans were in shock. After 55 successful American
space flights in 25 years, people had got used to seeing the astronauts’
safe return as something natural. Many thought that just about any young
man could fly into space after only a few short months of pre-flight training.
Joyful and energetic, Sharon Christa McAuliffe was to become the
symbol of a new era and one can regret that it all came to an end in a
matter of just a few short seconds... Such a pity that Sharon Christa never
used her chance to hold space lessons that would certainly go down in the
history of education.
The fiery end of the seven daring astronauts sent shock waves
of pain and sympathy throughout the world, but the Americans were the hardest
pained. In Los Angeles they lit the Olympic fire put out after the 1984
Olympics. In New York the tallest skyscrapers were blacked out and in Florida
22,000 people held an oceanside vigil with burning torches in hand…
Four days later America bid its last farewells to the perished
astronauts…
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