Posted on 01/28/2009 12:00:07 PM PST by patriotgal1787
That’s about right. The O-rings froze and were rigid so they didn’t make a good seal. Like rubber washers on the kitchen faucet they are supposed to be squishy so they seal and don’t leak.
The morning that happened I was a dj on a radio station in Maine. After we broadcast the shuttle loss we went back to music. I was so upset I played the next song in the line up without thinking, “Spinning Wheel” by BS&T. The starting lyrics are...”what goes up. Must go down”. One of the worse days of my life. I caught hell from all sides and damn well deserved it. It wasn’t intentional. If I had one error in my life I could take back, it would probably be that one. God bless the crew from the space shuttle Challenger. They’ll be in my families nightly prayers tonight.
I was fresh out of the Air Force, in my first college semester. I had just returned to my dorm after a class, and noticed that the lobby TV had the launch on. Out of probably 3 dozen people in the lobby, only 2 of us bothered to even notice it.
I knew what had happened almost as soon as it hit the screen, though I was incredulous. It took everyone else a little while to catch on, but needless to say it became the topic of the day.
Thanks. I understand now.
Tomorrow will be a “Day of Remembrance” for us here at Kennedy Space Center for the Apollo and Shuttle astronauts.
I was swabbing the after mess deck aboard the Enterprise when a buddy ran down from the ship’s TV studio to tell me about it. We were inbound to Pearl Harbor at the time, which was early in the morning in Hawaii. The captain made an announcement over the 1MC a few minutes later.
As we steamed past the Arizona monument later that day, the flag over the sunken ship was at half mast. I’ll never forget it.
We were busy at work at Nellis AFB fixing jet engines, when MSgt Blackburn came out on the floor, asked everyone to be quiet, and announced that Challenger had exploded shortly after liftoff. We managed to find a television and ran an antenna up on the hangar roof so we could watch what news we could find on it. Seems like yesterday sometimes.
Watched it live from the parking lot at Patrick AFB Hospital. I saw the trail split into two curving trails and knew something was terribly wrong. The hospital went into lockdown as we prepared for mass casualties from falling debris. The only patient we got was one of the wives of the astronauts who was brought in for sedation and rest. What a day. It ranks up there with the day JFK was shot and the day we started bombing Iraq. Of course then there was 911.
If I remember correctly, there was at least one NASA engineer who was concerned about those O-rings before the catastrophe, but he was ignored. Somewhat like the lower-level FBI agent who was ignored when she warned about the al-Qaeda guys going to flight school. The agent later got in touch with famed physicist Richard Feynman, who made a demonstration of how the O-rings go rigid at low temperatures before the commission investigating the crash, of which Feynman was a member. If only there had been someone like that at the 9-11 commission. Instead, we got guilty lawyers and political hacks dedicated to exonerating the Demonrats.
I was a Deputy Combat Crew Commander stationed at Grand Forks, North Dakota.
It was snowing as I drove a Suburban out to C-0, an Squadron Command Post, to get trained as a Command Post Crew. A instructor crew was on duty in the capsule.
I processed onto the facility topside and when I walked into the Support Building I saw everyone around the TV in the lounge and saw the exact moment the crew compartment hit the water.
Had a very hard time concentrating on my training downstairs after coding in.
I think another fact that you touch on peripherally is that from the inception of the space program, the rigors of astronaut selection and training imbued those folks with something of a superhuman air...they symbolized what was the best about America, and losing them was a personal reminder of our own mortality.
I think you summed it up perfectly, keep up the great work on your radio program.
I recall seeing some of that; I believe he also demonstrated that NASA had revised the lubricant/sealant that the O-rings were mounted with. Due to the greenazi's, NASA had removed the asbestos fibre from the lube. Feynman fished a chunk out of a glass of ice and water, and the compound without the asbestos powdered in his fingers, the one with the fibres retained its suppleness.
I was in a company's lounge watching on TV in Upstate NY. The silence was deafening once the realization hit - quickly - that those seven would never return. The rest of the day was very subdued, as if we'd all lost some very close friends.
NASA has a site - http://www.nasa.gov/externalflash/dor09/index_noaccess.html - with Remembrance of all the Astronauts who have given their lives in our quest for freedom from our surly bonds. God rest them all.
Feynman was tremendous researcher - i’ve read most of his account of the shuttle commission.
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