Challenger disaster 30 years ago

[mako88sb]

Hard to believe it's been 30 years already. I was looking over some blueprints with a draftsman and heard on his radio the breaking news. I went into the main office and told everybody about it. One guy just laughed as he put his walk-man headphones on. He thought I was joking but his face transformed instantly when he heard it as well. Much like 9/11, I was in a bit of a daze for awhile.

[darren r]

I'd been out all day so hadn't heard about it. I turned the TV on when I got home and the news was showing footage of the launch. I sat down to watch it, not expecting anything unusual to happen. It was like a punch in the gut when it did.

[bknight]

I was on a job in South  Texas and there was a delay in starting  work  that morning  and I was still in my motel  room watching  TV. I caught the final minutes  of the countdown to launch. I like  others  who watched saw the disaster live, with the PA anouncing flight parameters after the obvious to the viewers what was being announced was sripted.  I sat in shock knowing the crew was likely not going to survive.

[Cat Not Included]

My brain at least thinks it remembers very clearly the columns of smoke going in different directions. I may have confabulated it though, because I would have been watching it on TV with my class in school. You people are making me feel young at least.

Sad day for the space program.

[smartcooky]

Its one of those moments in history that I will always remember where I was when I first heard about it.

I was still in the Air Force at the time, and I had been playing cricket for Woobourne AFB against Te Rapa AFB at Hamilton in the Inter-Station One-Day Cricket competition. We walked into the cafeteria during the lunch break, and the chap behind the counter said "Did you guys hear that the shuttle exploded?"

Now you have to understand that to most RNZAF personnel "the shuttle" was a scheduled military flight that ran daily up and down the country from Whenuapai AFB in the north to Wigram AFB in the south; usually a C-130 or an HS 780. The RNZAF is such a small service that the chances of knowing someone in such a crash are quite high. My immediate thought, which I vocalised out loud was something t the effect the... "I hope there wasn't anyone we know on board" The chap behind the counter looked at me strangely... then realised.... "No. the space shuttle, it blew up!!"

[LunarOrbit]

I was in grade 5 at the time. We didn't watch the launch in class, fortunately. I found out about it from a school crossing guard when I was walking home during my lunch break.

I was only 10 years old, but I remember all of the publicity for the teacher in space program prior to the launch, watching the explosion over and over again on TV, the search for debris afterwards, and President Reagan's address. It's hard to believe it has been 30 years.

[DD Brock]

I was a sophomore in high school  in a Graphic Arts class at the time , and we always had the radio tuned to a local rock station. They broke into whatever song was playing and announced it on the air. I remember we all just sat there in stunned silence. Afterwards for whatever reason I kept looking at the sky that day, I can still remember the cloud patterns I saw. Weird, huh?

[LunarOrbit]

Afterwards for whatever reason I kept looking at the sky that day, I can still remember the cloud patterns I saw. Weird, huh?

For a long time afterwards the contrails from airplanes would remind me of Challenger.

[Dalhousie]

I was having my morning shower listening to the news on the radio.  They way they described it I thought "maybe someone got out".  I finished my shower, told my wife and then went and switched on the TV.  I immediately realised that nobody could have survived.

[gillianren]

I was in third grade.  I was running an errand for the teacher or something; I don't remember exactly what, but I was out of class.  The aide from my second grade class saw me.  She stopped me to tell me about it, because she thought I would care.  She was right, too.  Simon's godmother's dad was one of the finalists, too.

[sts60]

I was in college when a classmate ran through our commons and told me as he passed.  Later, I worked with a guy who had been a FDO for that mission. 

[ka9q]

I was one of the few people who saw it live, on CNN. None of the other networks carried it, and we didn't have NASA TV on cable. I hadn't tired of watching launches yet, so that day I delayed going into work so I could watch the launch from home.

The most surreal parts for me were the commentator's routine recitation of altitude and speed just after the breakup, and later the audible background whine in the audio as no one spoke for a long time.

[Ishkabibble]

I was a junior in college then. My then-girlfriend and I decided to play hooky from school and spend the day lazing around the house in sweats, watching TV, being lazy and doing little else because it was so bloody cold outside. We were also watching it on CNN, and I don't remember anything else that happened that day.

[Peter B]

The first I heard about the accident was actually reporting of people's reaction to the accident on the evening news. This was very puzzling to me because it was initially unclear to me exactly what people were reacting to.

I'd read the paper in the morning, which at best may have had a brief article about the impending launch. But then I saw and heard no news during the day until the evening news at 7pm.

The thing is that the launch was at about 2.30am local time, so I was asleep at the time, and well after the morning newspaper had been printed. By not hearing or seeing any news during the day, it was something like 16 hours after the accident before I knew anything about it.

By contrast I first heard about the Columbia accident about 8 hours after the fact.

[Luckmeister]

The thing is that the launch was at about 2.30am local time, so I was asleep at the time, and well after the morning newspaper had been printed. By not hearing or seeing any news during the day, it was something like 16 hours after the accident before I knew anything about it.

My memory of it was a friend who worked at Boeing developing the stealth technology calling me saying, "The Shuttle just blew up right after launch." I said, "Oh no, we lost the teacher." He responded with, "Teacher hell, we lost the Shuttle," to which I said, "Well that's a difference between us; I grieve first for the human loss and you grieve for the material loss." Yes, my first thought was of the children in classrooms watching as their brave roll model gave her life for exploration and education. And the bloodthirsty media kept showing the shocked disbelief of her parents as it turned to realization and horror. What a terrible day that was.