Where were you when the Challenger blew?

I was sitting in my office in Auburn Hills chatting with my secretary, TV on in the background.   1st US Space disaster since I was a kid, it seemed hard to believe at first that they were dead.  I kept hoping somehow the crew capsule survived impact with the ocean.



http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Space_Shuttle_Challenger_disaster

LooseGoose wrote:I was sitting in my office in Auburn Hills chatting with my secretary, TV on in the background.



http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Space_Shuttle_Challenger_disaster

you're old..

I was in high school - having a snow day in western North Carolina.. had walked over to a friends house and we were watching it.

I was sitting in 6th grade, and they wheeled in the TV and we watched the coverage all day. Then when I got home my brother made some shitty joke about it and that's when I started to realize he's kind of a douchebag.

I was at work in my office at the ripe age of 24.

The geezer in the office across from mine had a small b & w TV in his office, something like 6", and several people huddled around to watch.

It wasn't until I got home that night that I saw the disaster in color.

Robert J Sakimano wrote:you're old..

I was in high school - having a snow day in western North Carolina.. had walked over to a friends house and we were watching it.

I'm old enough that I vaguely remember sitting in our living room watching JFK's funeral with my mother.

LooseGoose wrote:

I'm old enough that I vaguely remember sitting in our living room watching JFK's funeral with my mother.

wow you are old.

trying to recall my first memory of a historical event.. I remember the hostage crisis during the Carter Administration - I was about 6-7 then..

Rocinante wrote:I was sitting in 6th grade, and they wheeled in the TV and we watched the coverage all day. Then when I got home my brother made some shitty joke about it and that's when I started to realize he's kind of a douchebag.

I was in 7th grade, and the same thing with them wheeling a TV in. The fact that they brought TVs in for us to watch the coverage kind of immediately brought home how big it was. I was in Social Studies, but all the science classes were watching live when it happened.

Any launch was a big deal back then. If we weren't in school, most people I knew would have been watching it live. Adding in the fact that the teacher was going, made it even bigger, and that was all before the tragedy happened.

About a month later, we just happened to be in Florida for winter break, and went to Kennedy Space Center. It was a sad and surreal time to be there. We had heard that the countdown clock was always counting down to the next planned mission, but apparently for the first time since the shuttle missions began, it was turned off at that time.

MiamiSpartan wrote:
I was in 7th grade, and the same thing with them wheeling a TV in. The fact that they brought TVs in for us to watch the coverage kind of immediately brought home how big it was. I was in Social Studies, but all the science classes were watching live when it happened.

Any launch was a big deal back then. If we weren't in school, most people I knew would have been watching it live. Adding in the fact that the teacher was going, made it even bigger, and that was all before the tragedy happened.

About a month later, we just happened to be in Florida for winter break, and went to Kennedy Space Center. It was a sad and surreal time to be there. We had heard that the countdown clock was always counting down to the next planned mission, but apparently for the first time since the shuttle missions began, it was turned off at that time.

Now that you mention it, we may have been watching the launch before the explosion also.

Rocinante wrote:

Now that you mention it, we may have been watching the launch before the explosion also.

yeah, back then every launch was a huge deal.. it was kinda like.. I don't know.. someone shooting a shuttle into outer space..

Robert J Sakimano wrote:yeah, back then every launch was a huge deal.. it was kinda like.. I don't know.. someone shooting a shuttle into outer space..

I was still at MSU when STS-1 launched. It was such a big deal that we got up at 5AM to watch the pre-launch coverage, tap a keg and watch the blast off.

Floyd Robertson wrote:

I was still at MSU when STS-1 launched. It was such a big deal that we got up at 5AM to watch the pre-launch coverage, tap a keg and watch the blast off.

nice...

(oh - and I had to google STS-1.. not because I'm some young whippersnapper.. more because I'm not terribly bright)..

Not even close to being fuckin born.

Ms. Schmidt's 4th grade room. I remember another teacher coming in and pulling her aside, and her putting her hands to her mouth. They talked for a few minutes quietly as we all watched. When the other teacher left, someone asked her what happened/what was wrong and she said "They think the space shuttle might have blown up when it was launching."

I remember later thinking about how dumb of a statement that was after seeing the video. They "think"???

Robert J Sakimano wrote:you're old..

I was in high school - having a snow day in western North Carolina.. had walked over to a friends house and we were watching it.

You sound kind of old, too.

Robert J Sakimano wrote:
you're old..

I was in high school - having a snow day in western North Carolina.. had walked over to a friends house and we were watching it.

You grew up in North Carolina?? Should my inner monologue start reading your posts with a funny southern drawl?

Turtleneck wrote:

You sound kind of old, too.

All yall mothafuckas are old.

Other Teams Pursuing That wrote:

All yall mothafuckas are old.

To honest, it is better to be old than just out of puberty like you and Ass Dan.

Turtleneck wrote:

To honest, it is better to be old than just out of puberty like you and Ass Dan.

Just out of puberty? When did you hit puberty weirdo?

LooseGoose wrote:

I'm old enough that I vaguely remember sitting in our living room watching JFK's funeral with my mother.

I vaguely remember watching reports the day of the shooting on our B/W Zenith.

Was at work the day of the Challenger. Heard reports but didn't see footage until I got home. Have kept a couple newspapers over the years that would take some searching to find. One was after the Tigers 84 World Series win. The other was the day after the Challenger disaster.

Other Teams Pursuing That wrote:

Just out of puberty? When did you hit puberty weirdo?

http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/health/4566319.stm

Turtleneck wrote:

You sound kind of old, too.

45, brah..

Travis of the Cosmos wrote:
You grew up in North Carolina?? Should my inner monologue start reading your posts with a funny southern drawl?

yeah, possibly..

though I've lived in Michigan now for about 22 years.. don't hijack the thread, dude.

Robert J Sakimano wrote:45, brah..

Do you enjoy a Werther's Original every now and again? Maybe while you're telling stories about the war?

Turtleneck wrote:

http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/health/4566319.stm

Now I'm just confused.

I was asleep. I was hungover and staggered to the john (First Floor Snyder) - on way back noticed a bunch of people crowded into RA's room watching coverage of the aftermath on tv.

Sitting in my 5th grade classroom. Our principal didn't announce it until just before we were done for the day. I remember the hallways being pretty much silent once school let out for the day.

WhiteBoyHatcher wrote:Ms. Schmidt's 4th grade room. I remember another teacher coming in and pulling her aside, and her putting her hands to her mouth. They talked for a few minutes quietly as we all watched. When the other teacher left, someone asked her what happened/what was wrong and she said "They think the space shuttle might have blown up when it was launching."

I remember later thinking about how dumb of a statement that was after seeing the video. They "think"???

Yeah, but it wasn't like the Apollo that burned on the launch pad, this was thousands and thousands of feet in the air with only relatively grainy (and limited) TV footage. And if word was just starting to spread, there would have still been a lot of confusion, as NASA wouldn't have talked yet and the networks wouldn't have had any experts on yet. When you see the TV broadcasts from that day, they were pretty sure what happened, but in the first minutes after it happened, it's hard to speak in such definite terms. People were trying to hold out some flicker of hope thinking that the shuttle itself may have separated and it was just the tanks that exploded.

Amazingly enough they were alive until they hit the water. Can you imagine that 2 minute 45 second ride down?

Watch Out Pylon! wrote:Sitting in my 5th grade classroom. Our principal didn't announce it until just before we were done for the day. I remember the hallways being pretty much silent once school let out for the day.

Wow, that seems like quite a dick move by the principal. It wasn't like it happened an hour before school was out (unless you had a half day), it happened before noon. The whole country is in shock and mourning with an event unlike anything since JFK was shot, but he wanted to make sure that those long division lessons didn't get interrupted.

Other Teams Pursuing That wrote:

Now I'm just confused.

It's because your young, underdeveloped brain is not capable of grasping the subtleties of message board sarcasm.

And then the jokes.....

Q. What does NASA stand for?
A. Need Another Seven Astronauts

Q. What was Christa MCauliffe's last words?
A. What does this button do?

MiamiSpartan wrote:
Wow, that seems like quite a dick move by the principal. It wasn't like it happened an hour before school was out (unless you had a half day), it happened before noon. The whole country is in shock and mourning with an event unlike anything since JFK was shot, but he wanted to make sure that those long division lessons didn't get interrupted.

Never got an explanation... because we were kids. I would like to have heard the conversation in the teachers lounge about keeping it under wraps until the end of the day.

Dr. Strangelove wrote:Amazingly enough they were alive until they hit the water. Can you imagine that 2 minute 45 second ride down?

It's assumed that any survivors blacked out seconds after the initial breakup of the shuttle.

Watch Out Pylon! wrote:

It's assumed that any survivors blacked out seconds after the initial breakup of the shuttle.

That assumption is wrong.

An Eternity of Descent

Mercifully unconscious?
But even if the crew cabin had survived intact, wouldn’t the violent pitching and yawing of the cabin as it descended toward the ocean created G-forces so strong as to render the astronauts unconscious?

That may have once been believed. But that was before the investigation turned up the key piece of evidence that led to the inescapable conclusion that they were alive: On the trip down, the commander and pilot’s reserved oxygen packs had been turned on by astronaut Judy Resnik, seated directly behind them. Furthermore, the pictures, which showed the cabin riding its own velocity in a ballistic arc, did not support an erratic, spinning motion. And even if there were G-forces, commander Dick Scobee was an experienced test pilot, habituated to them.

The evidence led experts to conclude the seven astronauts lived. They worked frantically to save themselves through the plummeting arc that would take them 2 minutes and 45 seconds to smash into the ocean.

That is when they died — after an eternity of descent.

I was a poor undergraduate student in my Junior year with a full class load and working two jobs to pay the bills. I literally knew nothing about it until later that day or perhaps even the next. I don't think I saw footage until a couple of years later. Obviously way before the 24-hr news cycle and ubiquitous access to media, plus one of my room-mates at the time sat on the couch watching Star Trek and/or pornos at all times when not in class.

In retrospect, he probably had no idea the disaster happened, either.

Zapp Brannigan wrote:I was a poor undergraduate student in my Junior year with a full class load and working two jobs to pay the bills. I literally knew nothing about it until later that day or perhaps even the next. I don't think I saw footage until a couple of years later. Obviously way before the 24-hr news cycle and ubiquitous access to media, plus one of my room-mates at the time sat on the couch watching Star Trek and/or pornos at all times when not in class.

In retrospect, he probably had no idea the disaster happened, either.

I don't remember rooming with you

Walking to a history class at Michigan State University. I believe we were studying the !Kung bushmen of the Kalahari desert.

Heat Miser wrote:Walking to a history class at Michigan State University. I believe we were studying the !Kung bushmen of the Kalahari desert.

Dang, I didn't think you were that old.

Cliffs on why civilians were going into space?

The_Dude wrote:Cliffs on why civilians were going into space?

Because they are far out man.....