"Mission Control: T minus 10,9,8,7,6, we have main engine start, 4,3,2,1, and lift off." Lift off of the 25th space shuttle mission and it had cleared the tower . . .
One minute 15 seconds, velocity 2,000 feet per second, altitude nine nautical miles, down range distance seven nautical miles. (long pause)
Flight controllers here looking very carefully at the situation (pause)
Obviously a major malfunction. We have to downlink (communications from challenger) (long pause)
Commander Francis R Scobee: "Roger, Go at 'throttle up'
Pilot Michael Smith: "Uh-oh"
Mission Control: We have a report from the flight dynamics office that the vehicle has exploded."
At 11:40 a.m. on January 28, 1986 as millions of Americans watched live, the space shuttle Challenger exploded into a ball of fire. Just as the Kennedy assassination was the baby boomers disaster, this tragedy became generation X's disaster. Everyone knows exactly where there were when they found out and everyone has etched in their minds the image of the explosion. The event made everyone question the need for manned space exploration -- any America fully backed the need to continue manned space exploration.
N.A.S.A. had experienced problems in the past but none measure up to the Challenger explosion. There were problems with the original Apollo launch when 3 astronauts were killed in a fire on the launching pad. That was the only time astronauts ever died. And to America, it was excusable, for the space program was in its infancy. With Apollo 11's landing on the moon people forget about the original Apollo tragedy and faith in NASA was renewed. Apollo 13 was a little scary when 3 astronauts were almost lost but the key word here is almost. From 1967 until the Challenger disaster, NASA has never lost an astronaut. The first question on everyone's mind was why and how the Challenger exploded. This was answered in a highly technical report released four months after the disaster by a Presidential Commission investigating the incident.
The report concluded that there were two main factors that led to the explosion. The first problem was a technical culprit and was easy to deal with. America was mature enough to release that there were inherent risks in space exploration. America took comfort in knowing that the mechanical problem would be corrected and this would not happen again.
The second reason, the general attitudes and philosophy of NASA were much more difficult to deal with. This attitude "kept the technical problem from being remedied despite nearly a decade of warnings, and which may result in the redesign of NASA itself" (Science News 372).
The mechanical breakdown that lead to the explosion was the "O- ring seals between the rearmost segment of the shuttle's right- hand solid-rocket booster (SRB) (Sciences News 372). The failure was due to a fault design unacceptably sensitive to a number of factors (Office Report of the Presidential Commission on the Explosion of the Space Shuttle Challenger). The main factor that lead to the breakdown of the seal was temperature which was 28.5F at the time of the explosion (Science News 372). The O-ring "did not rebound enough to keep in the hot fumes from the propellant firing just inside it" (Official Report).
The second factor, the lack of communication and general attitude of NASA was a little more frightening. O-Ring problem were discovered in 1977 (Science News 372). The engineering company, Thiokol, that designed the O-Ring later discovered a flaw (in 1977) and reported it to the commission that selected Thiokol as the company that would develop the new rocket design. The commission ignored the report because so much money and time had already be invested in the project. Even after significant erosion to the O-rings were discovered during shuttle flights in 1981 nothing was done. This combined with NASA pressing for more frequent flights, and NASA placing the task of giving an OK to a flight to shuttle program managers and taking it away from an impartial division was a recipe for disaster (Science News 372).
Though most of America said they wanted to know the reason, most could not begin to comprehend the actual cause when the official report was released. America's faith in N.A.S.A. had been jolted by the tragedy but America knew that they could not give up.
Discussion about the tragedy revived the debate between manned versus unmanned space exploration. Scientist like James Van Allen, discoverer of the Van Allen radiation belts that surround the earth contended that "there are few scientific or commercial purposes that cannot be served by unmanned, automated spacecraft; these can be launched and operated at a fraction of the cost of putting humans into space" (Time Magazine 41). Astronomer Thomas Gold adds that "manned flight is enormously expensive, unmanageable, risky, and dangerous. (Time Magazine 41).
The response to these arguments are that only with humans and manned space flights could the current space technology be 'maintained and repaired.' Machines cannot build the space stations which is NASA ultimate goal. There is also a political argument that goes along with this questions. Proponents of manned space flight argue than only with the drama of human involved will America allow the massive amounts of money that needs to be spent on space exploration.
America, even immediately right after the tragedy supported the continued support of NASA and specifically manned space exploration. In a US News & World Report poll recorded right after the tragedy 69% of Americans felt the US should keep spending at the current level for the space shuttle program while only 25% felt that funding should be reduced. The same poll also found 75 percent of Americans felt that America should continue with manned space probes with 17 percent saying that America should switch entirely to unmanned probes.
The cynicism of Van Allen can be found during any era of exploration of a new frontier. Some Europeans during the 15th and 16th century surely felt that there was no need to venture to the new world. But lucky for the world most people disagreed. Space is our new world. We don't know what we will find but we know that it will only be found if we look for it.
President Reagan spoke to the nation on the night of the tragedy. His words united America, and expressed much of the sentiments that everyone felt. He said that "He always had great faith and respect for our space program, and what happened today did nothing to diminish it. According to a US News & World Report Poll, America, by a 73 to 22 percent majority agreed with Reagan that the explosion was "a regrettable disaster but nevertheless a price we must be willing to pay for the exploration and mastery of space." (US News 21)
The Challenger Explosion was Generation X's Kennedy Assassination. Many people feel that the youth who grew up in the sixties lost their childhood when Kennedy was assassinated. The assignation forced children to deal with the realities of the real world. The Challenger Explosion brought that same kind of disillusionment to generation X. Generation X, up until this point, saw the Cold War being won, an economic boon, as well as success in general by Americans (i.e. the 1984 Olympic games). The Challenger explosion made them aware that things do go wrong.
And in the end the words that Reagan specifically addressed to the school children of American ring most true "I know it's hard to understand that sometimes painful things like this happen. It's all a part of the process of exploration and discovery, it's all a part of taking a chance and expanding man's horizons. The future does not belong to the fainthearted. It belongs to the brave."