Shuttle launch today

[riverc0il]

That's not to say walking on the moon wasn't dramatic, but it is still the only example of a space flight going horribly wrong and yet all the astronauts were recovered alive.

challenger went horribly wrong. i still remember watching the replays on TV when i was in middle school. i swear they had a TV in every class room with the news on when it happened. crazy.

 

[JimG.]

challenger went horribly wrong. i still remember watching the replays on TV when i was in middle school. i swear they had a TV in every class room with the news on when it happened. crazy.

The Challenger disaster really shook me up; part of that was because of the incessant media blitz. The fact that all the astronauts died was very hard to bear.

In a way, Apollo 13 was even more difficult because for days you knew these guys were in trouble and they could have died at any moment. The worst was during re-entry because nobody knew if the heat shield had been damaged and, of course, there was a radio blackout until just before they splashed down.

I'll never forget sitting in class and hearing that they were OK; everyone stood up and cheered and hollered.

 

[Paul]

challenger went horribly wrong. i still remember watching the replays on TV when i was in middle school. i swear they had a TV in every class room with the news on when it happened. crazy.

The Challenger disaster really shook me up; part of that was because of the incessant media blitz. The fact that all the astronauts died was very hard to bear.

In a way, Apollo 13 was even more difficult because for days you knew these guys were in trouble and they could have died at any moment. The worst was during re-entry because nobody knew if the heat shield had been damaged and, of course, there was a radio blackout until just before they splashed down.

I'll never forget sitting in class and hearing that they were OK; everyone stood up and cheered and hollered.

I think, for me, the worst part of the Challenger disaster (if you can quantify any of it) was that there was a civilian on board. Watching the reactions of Christa McAuliffe's students, and the other children in her school was completely heart-wrenching. The initial cheering and smiling giving way to shock, horror and disbelief....

And the cameras just kept rolling...

 

[ctenidae]

Amazing, though, how quickly after Challenger the NASA jokes started flying around. Of course, that was the age of Ethiopian jokes, Polack jokes, and the like. Don't see much of that anymore. I guess there is an upside to the PC movement.

 

[dmc]

Amazing, though, how quickly after Challenger the NASA jokes started flying around. Of course, that was the age of Ethiopian jokes, Polack jokes, and the like. Don't see much of that anymore. I guess there is an upside to the PC movement.

I've heard a couple already..

 

[bigbog]

NASA.......

The Voyagers, Mars probes, and other unmanned projects are/have been great. Good stuff ct... They've received realtively scant coverage on TV while the manned, showboat projects live on in the bright lights....and in the funding from Washington. :roll:

 

[hammer]

STS-114 has lifted off:

http://www.nasa.gov/returntoflight/main/index.html?skipIntro=1

 

[ctenidae]

Go baby, go!

 

[bvibert]

The shuttle docked with the space station this morning!

NASA has grounded shuttle flights again though, due to a big piece of foam falling off of the fuel tank again. The crew completed a check of the shuttle's tiles yesterday though, so they should be safe to return to Earth when their mission is complete.

 

[pizza]

I think, for me, the worst part of the Challenger disaster (if you can quantify any of it) was that there was a civilian on board. Watching the reactions of Christa McAuliffe's students, and the other children in her school was completely heart-wrenching. The initial cheering and smiling giving way to shock, horror and disbelief....

In retrospect, the involvement of kids was the worst part. Kids thought "that could have been my own teacher in that thing."

I was in the 5th grade at the time.

 

[Paul]

I think, for me, the worst part of the Challenger disaster (if you can quantify any of it) was that there was a civilian on board. Watching the reactions of Christa McAuliffe's students, and the other children in her school was completely heart-wrenching. The initial cheering and smiling giving way to shock, horror and disbelief....

In retrospect, the involvement of kids was the worst part. Kids thought "that could have been my own teacher in that thing."

I was in the 5th grade at the time.

Yikes!! I was in High School. Our physics teacher (who allegedly worked for NASA :roll: ) made sure we all watched every gorey detail...

One of those days (along with the Reagan assassination attempt, and the murder of John Lennon)I will NEVER be able to forget.

 

[loafer89]

I understand the need for safety, but I think that NASA is going a bit overboard with grounding the shuttle. With the extreme forces that the space shuttle is subjected to at launch, I really doubt that they will be able to eliminate the debris risk.

The shuttle and it's tile system seem too fragile and expensive to maintain, perhaps a single use system like the Russians are using is a better interem answer until a replacement for the shuttle is built.

The real problem now, is that critical, key, heavy pieces of the space station can only be brought up by the shuttle, and they are needed to complete the station and keep it viable.

The Russians must be very dissapointed with the news of the groundings. NASA just announced that they are really perplexed with how to solve the debris problem.

 

[Cannon Gray]

I was always wondering if the shuttle program wasn't closed after those disasters and continued to be launched then why it was closed only in 2011 saying that it is to dangerous and so on..