Space Shuttle Challenger: 30th anniversary of explosion (1 Viewer)

[ShaqAttaq]

Why did they launch in cold weather?

because the launch was already on reagan's cue cards for the State of the Union speech.

 

[Mr. Pickles]

My dad was a driver for Coca Cola and his route covered Cape Canaveral. While he was sad by the tragedy, he was excited for the opportunity that suddenly presented itself.

 

[bakes]

I was working selling cameras in a department store. I got into work that morning and nobody was around. The only noise I heard was from over near the appliances and TV department. I walked over and the entire store staff, from the manager on down, was watching the launch and subsequent replay on about eight or nine different TVs. Everybody just stood there in silence. it didn't matter which brand - RCA Colortrak, zenith, Sony Trinitron, GE - they all had ####ty pictures that morning.

 

[Fennis]

My dad was a driver for Coca Cola and his route covered Cape Canaveral. While he was sad by the tragedy, he was excited for the opportunity that suddenly presented itself.

well, prior to that explosion, NASA only had 7-up products.

 

[MikeIke]

Why did they launch in cold weather?

Hubris. All previous shuttle launches had been successful. NASA hasn't really had a failure since Apollo 13, they felt invulnerable. There was also a lot if pressure from the top to stay on schedule because there were quite a few launches scheduled that year. They wanted to show that launches could become routine.

Basically the people who had no idea how the shuttle actually worked made the decision despite warnings from the guys who worked on it.

 

[pats3in4]

10th grade Chemistry class

Also in 10th grade, in cafeteria, when a classmate asked, "Did you hear about the shuttle exploding?" We went into our chem teacher's room to watch the coverage on TV.

 

[Jedi Knight]

I was across the river from the launch pad. My dad had asked me to make some deliveries for him that morning in Cocoa Beach and Titusville. Shuttle launches had become fairly routine, but when I turned on the radio that morning, they had an update that the launch would take place. Something inside of me told me that i HAD to see that launch.

I chose a place off of US1 that had a clear view, right next to a strip office building. As the final countdown began, a couple of ladies from that office came out to watch. One of them had never seen a live launch. I was standing their with my car door open and the radio cranked and we watched the lift-off.

When it blew, I remember my brain telling me that something really horrible just happening, but my heart not wanting to accept it. I remember hoping for long minutes that we would see the shuttle fly out of the explosion cloud to land at the KSC runway, or even Patrick AFB...or parachutes...something. For a quick funny moment, the girl who had never seen a launch asked her friend if that was "booster seperation"- her boyfriend had told about booster seperation. I looked at her and said, "Something seperated, but it wasn't just the boosters." I'll never forget the look on her face as the horror set in. To this day, I do not remember driving home- one of only two times that has happened.

I worked at Satellite Beach Pizza Hut, which was located on the south end of Patrick Air Force base. I had to close that night, and I will never forget how truly "funeral-like" the atmosphere was. Hardly anyone was talking. Most of our customers were from Patrick and they were charged with search and rescue. We had a jukebox that softly played background radio when it wasn't being played. When a news update came on, everything just stopped and every single person strained to hear, hoping against hope that something good would finally come across like they had found a survivor or something. One of the worst shifts I have ever worked.

The creepiest thing I remember was how the exhaust contrails and explosion cloud lingered all damn day in the air. There was no wind and it hung in the sky like a scorpion cloud. I think it was near sundown before it finally dispersed. Truly an awful day.

 

[SaintsInDome2006]

Really sad tale here:

30 Years After Explosion, Challenger Engineer Still Blames HimselfThirty years ago, as the nation mourned the loss of seven astronauts on the space shuttle Challenger, Bob Ebeling was steeped in his own deep grief.

The night before the launch, Ebeling and four other engineers at NASA contractor Morton Thiokol had tried to stop the launch. Their managers and NASA overruled them.

That night, he told his wife, Darlene, "It's going to blow up."

When Challenger exploded 73 seconds after liftoff, Ebeling and his colleagues sat stunned in a conference room at Thiokol's headquarters outside Brigham City, Utah. They watched the spacecraft explode on a giant television screen and they knew exactly what had happened.

Three weeks later, Ebeling and another engineer separately and anonymously detailed to NPR the first account of that contentious pre-launch meeting. Both were despondent and in tears as they described hours of data review and arguments. The data showed that the rubber seals on the shuttle's booster rockets wouldn't seal properly in cold temperatures and this would be the coldest launch ever.

...

http://www.npr.org/sections/thetwo-way/2016/01/28/464744781/30-years-after-disaster-challenger-engineer-still-blames-himself?utm_campaign=storyshare&utm_source=twitter.com&utm_med

 

[NREC34]

I was in Jr. High at the time.

Oh do I remember the jokes going around at school afterwards.

 

[ClownCausedChaos2]

Really sad tale here:

30 Years After Explosion, Challenger Engineer Still Blames Himself

Thirty years ago, as the nation mourned the loss of seven astronauts on the space shuttle Challenger, Bob Ebeling was steeped in his own deep grief.

The night before the launch, Ebeling and four other engineers at NASA contractor Morton Thiokol had tried to stop the launch. Their managers and NASA overruled them.

That night, he told his wife, Darlene, "It's going to blow up."

When Challenger exploded 73 seconds after liftoff, Ebeling and his colleagues sat stunned in a conference room at Thiokol's headquarters outside Brigham City, Utah. They watched the spacecraft explode on a giant television screen and they knew exactly what had happened.

Three weeks later, Ebeling and another engineer separately and anonymously detailed to NPR the first account of that contentious pre-launch meeting. Both were despondent and in tears as they described hours of data review and arguments. The data showed that the rubber seals on the shuttle's booster rockets wouldn't seal properly in cold temperatures and this would be the coldest launch ever.

...

http://www.npr.org/sections/thetwo-way/2016/01/28/464744781/30-years-after-disaster-challenger-engineer-still-blames-himself?utm_campaign=storyshare&utm_source=twitter.com&utm_med

Wow. That poor man.

 

[Alex P Keaton]

Why did they launch in cold weather?

because the launch was already on reagan's cue cards for the State of the Union speech.

It was this paired with arrogance of NASA leaders + a desire to justify the ask of more budget dollars.

 

[Buckna]

Why did they launch in cold weather?

Hubris. All previous shuttle launches had been successful. NASA hasn't really had a failure since Apollo 13, they felt invulnerable. There was also a lot if pressure from the top to stay on schedule because there were quite a few launches scheduled that year. They wanted to show that launches could become routine.

Basically the people who had no idea how the shuttle actually worked made the decision despite warnings from the guys who worked on it.

Higher level managers at the engineering firm that built the boosters also were partly to blame.

Another interesting thing that came out of the Challenger tradgedy is that it is used as a case study in some business communication and writing workshops. They use actual engineering memo's written about how the o'rings would fail but the memo's are so poorly written (ie, way to technical and dense for example instead of clear and concise) its hard to make heads or tails out of the memo.