For the most part, I don’t remember seeing the Challenger explosion on TV at school, even though several of my friends say we saw it.
Maybe they did and I was sick that day. I was almost certain it was a snow day so the school had canceled classes that day. I was in the first grade and only 7 so I probably don’t remember too well.
On this date, Jan. 28, 1986, seven astronauts took off in the Challenger shuttle for what was supposed to be a historic flight as Christa McAuliffe, a teacher from Concord, N.M., was one of the crew members. There had been a huge public relations push to get young people more interested in space travel. So, not only was McAuliffe a teacher but the liftoff would be shown live to schools all around the country.
It would have a totally negative effect. At 73 seconds into its flight, the Challenger exploded at about 11:39 a.m. Eastern Standard Time, with debris falling all over Cape Canaveral and the Atlantic Ocean. People were stunned. Peter Billingsley, famous for his role in A Christmas Story, reportedly watched it live along with others at Canaveral as he was a spokesperson for the young astronauts program. He later said there was confusion among all the people there as they didn’t know exactly what had happened.
People I went to school with say they remember seeing it and cried. Other people have said the teachers just turned the TVs off without saying much. There really wasn’t much to say. My late girlfriend, Kerry, and her family were living in Florida at the time when they saw the explosion in the sky as they were on their way to a funeral. They didn’t know what it was at the time.
It was later determined after an investigation the failure of the primary and secondary O-rings in a joint in the right Space Shuttle Solid Rocket Booster. Since it was the middle of winter, Florida was experiencing record-low temperatures, well below freezing, on the morning of Jan. 28. This caused the rubber O-rings to stiffen, reducing the ability to seal the joints. Ice was even photographed on the launch towers hours before the launch.
Please remember those who lost their lives on this date:
- Dick Scobee, commander
- Michael J. Smith, pilot
- Ronald McNair, mission specialist
- Ellison Onizuka, mission specialist
- Judith Resnik, mission specialist
- Gregory Jarvis, payload specialist
- Christa McAuliffe, payload specialist, teacher
Zane Says 