Challenger: 25 years later



The STS-51L crew (courtesy of the Smithsonian)

 Today is the 25th anniversary of one of the most recognizable disasters in the history of space exploration: the Challenger explosion.  Most of us probably know the story of STS-51L.  73 seconds after liftoff, on national TV, the space shuttle stack exploded in a spectacular fireball, killing all of the crew members instantly.  This was one of those events where most of us old enough to remember know exactly where we were and what we were doing.  I was only 2, oblivous to what was happening on the TV, and only worried about when we were going to eat lunch.  My mother recalls remaining calm, certain that there was going to be an explanation for what that was.  When it became evident what had happened was not merely a mirage, the nation was in shock.  That evening, President Reagan said in an address to the nation, that this was a "national loss": a national loss indeed, in more ways that one.  One of the astronauts, Christa McAuliffe, was going to be the first schoolteacher in space, and was going to teach two lessons from the orbiter to her class in New Hampshire.  One of the things that Reagan emphasized in his speech was that space exploration must go on.  Challenger was a setback, no doubt, but the astronauts who perished in the disaster would have had it no other way. 

Watch this important piece of American history here.

Watch President Reagan's address to the nation here.


In many ways, the events that transpired after Challenger have dictated what's happening with our space program today.  There are actually many lessons we can learn from how the space program progressed afterward.  Reagan emphasized that the American space exploration must go on, and it did.  After an almost 3 year grounding, Discovery lifted off in September 1988.  Discovery was also the return-to-flight vehicle following the Columbia accident.  After Challenger, there was a national committment to continued space flight, that culminated in the construction of a new orbiter, Endeavour, which became operational in 1990.  In the meantime, a thorough investgation into the accident by the Rogers Commission concluded that that leaky O-rings in the SRBs were to blame for the physical cause of the accident.  At the same time, the decision to lauch was criticized as well, saying that there was not enough or inconclusive engineering data on the shuttle stack, which eluded shuttle managers.  This is a somewhat odd conclusion considering this launch was postponed several times due to unacceptable weather and other launch issues (escape hatch, TAL problems).  Nevertheless, for several years in the 80s, shuttle launches were a regular occurance, occuring several times a year.  After the initial return to flight, the launch schedule essentially resumed as it was, as NASA picked up several low-earth orbit projects, including the Hubble Space Telescope, the Mir missions, and the International Space Station.  The Columbia accident essentially put a halt to many of these projects, with the notable exception being the ISS. 

After Columbia, President Bush made a declaration that not only would the shuttle would return to flight, but following its retirement we would be back on the moon by 2020, and Mars by 2030.  While these goals were very lofty, with a low chance of success given what NASA had (has) to work with, he was hoping to achieve the same national effect that Reagan had with his Challenger speech, and that Kennedy had with his initial moon declaration in 1961.  Unfortunately, in 2003, people are not as excited about space research as they were when we competed against the USSR in the Space Race, so Bush's declarations went almost on deaf ears.  As I noted in my previous post on this subject, the end of the space shuttle could mean the end of American space exploration for some time.  The driving factor is that there is not as much national enthusiasm for space exploration and space research.  Perhaps this is because there is no USSR to compete against.  Perhaps this is because everyone is too worried about their health care.  Whatever the case, this is a shame considering that there are some exciting things going on at NASA, such as the James Webb Telescope which will replace the Hubble and be able see farther and more precise than ever before.  We do need a vehicle to get it into orbit, however.  When the shuttle is retired, what will replace it?   Unfortunately, we don't have an answer to that question at the present.

I wonder what the Challenger crew, especially Christa McAuliffe, would think of the direction of our current NASA and space program.  I don't think they would be too happy.