The Challenger Disaster
Posted on 01/28/2003 8:27:33 AM PST by Indy Pendance
Ladies and Gentlemen, I'd planned to speak to you tonight to report on the state of the Union, but the events of earlier today have led me to change those plans. Today is a day for mourning and remembering. Nancy and I are pained to the core by the tragedy of the shuttle Challenger. We know we share this pain with all of the people of our country. This is truly a national loss.
Nineteen years ago, almost to the day, we lost three astronauts in a terrible accident on the ground. But, we've never lost an astronaut in flight; we've never had a tragedy like this. And perhaps we've forgotten the courage it took for the crew of the shuttle; but they, the Challenger Seven, were aware of the dangers, but overcame them and did their jobs brilliantly. We mourn seven heroes: Michael Smith, Dick Scobee, Judith Resnik, Ronald McNair, Ellison Onizuka, Gregory Jarvis, and Christa McAuliffe. We mourn their loss as a nation together.
For the families of the seven, we cannot bear, as you do, the full impact of this tragedy. But we feel the loss, and we're thinking about you so very much. Your loved ones were daring and brave, and they had that special grace, that special spirit that says, 'Give me a challenge and I'll meet it with joy.' They had a hunger to explore the universe and discover its truths. They wished to serve, and they did. They served all of us.
We've grown used to wonders in this century. It's hard to dazzle us. But for twenty-five years the United States space program has been doing just that. We've grown used to the idea of space, and perhaps we forget that we've only just begun. We're still pioneers. They, the members of the Challenger crew, were pioneers.
And I want to say something to the schoolchildren of America who were watching the live coverage of the shuttle's takeoff. I know it is hard to understand, but sometimes painful things like this happen. It's all part of the process of exploration and discovery. It's all part of taking a chance and expanding man's horizons. The future doesn't belong to the fainthearted; it belongs to the brave. The Challenger crew was pulling us into the future, and we'll continue to follow them...
I've always had great faith in and respect for our space program, and what happened today does nothing to diminish it. We don't hide our space program. We don't keep secrets and cover things up. We do it all up front and in public. That's the way freedom is, and we wouldn't change it for a minute. We'll continue our quest in space. There will be more shuttle flights and more shuttle crews and, yes, more volunteers, more civilians, more teachers in space. Nothing ends here; our hopes and our journeys continue. I want to add that I wish I could talk to every man and woman who works for NASA or who worked on this mission and tell them: "Your dedication and professionalism have moved and impressed us for decades. And we know of your anguish. We share it."
There's a coincidence today. On this day 390 years ago, the great explorer Sir Francis Drake died aboard ship off the coast of Panama. In his lifetime the great frontiers were the oceans, and a historian later said, 'He lived by the sea, died on it, and was buried in it.' Well, today we can say of the Challenger crew: Their dedication was, like Drake's, complete.
The crew of the space shuttle Challenger honoured us by the manner in which they lived their lives. We will never forget them, nor the last time we saw them, this morning, as they prepared for the journey and waved goodbye and 'slipped the surly bonds of earth' to 'touch the face of God.'
Interesting. For me it was Eisenhower.
Not folklore. McGee, a Flight Lieutenant in the RAF, wrote it while flying a Spitfire. The family has the envelope he wrote it on. John McGee was killed in 1941 in a mid-air collision with a British military transport, an "Anson". The poem was carried by Apollo 11 Astronaut, Michael Collins as a tribute to the poems author. Collins read it out loud as he circled the Moon in July of 1969..
As God is my witness, I had the following conversation with a friend the night before:
Friend: There's another shuttle launch tomorrow.
Me: Nobody pays attention to those launches anymore. For it to be news, the thing would have to blow up.
I felt really bad about it for a while.
Reminds me of a conversation I had at Moran's in the World Financial Center a week before Sept 11. We were commenting on the 93 bombing & how incompetant the terrorists were that they couldn't bring the building down. Having read Tom Clancy, I guessed a plane loaded with explosives might do it. Weird.
Both Boisjoly and McDonald testified before the presidential panel regarding their opposition to the launch and the decision of their managers (who were also engineers) to override their recommendation. Both Boisjoly and McDonald also testified that following their expressed opposition to the launch and their willingness to come forward, they had been isolated from NASA and subsequently demoted. Since testifying, McDonald has been assigned to "special projects." Boisjoly, who took medical leave for post-traumatic stress disorder, has left Thiokol, but he does receive disability pay from the company. Currently, Mr. Boisjoly operates a consulting firm in Mesa, Arizona. He speaks frequently on business ethics to professional organizations and companies.
In May 1986, then-CEO Locke stated, in an interview with the Wall Street Journal, "This shuttle thing will cost us this year 10 cents a share." Locke later protested that his statement had been taken out of context.
In 1989, Morton Norwich separated from Thiokol Chemical Corporation. The two companies had previously merged to become Morton Thiokol. Following the separation, Thiokol Chemical became Thiokol Corporation. Morton returned to the salt business, and Thiokol, which will remain under contract with NASA through 1999, redesigned its space shuttle rocket motor to correct the deficiencies. No one at Thiokol was fired following the Challenger accident. Because of this incident and defense contractor indictments, the Government Accountability Project was established in Washington, D. C. The office provides a staff, legal assistance, and pamphlets to help whistle-blowers working on government projects.
You mean the engineers who sent message after message to NASA, telling them not to launch? Absolutely!!! The fault lies with the @#$%&^*()* bureaucratic IDIOTS who ignored them. Sadly, such idiots have more or less taken over at NASA.
Don't talk about the Chicago suburbs . . .
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I'm an engineer. I'm not sure if anyone who isn't an engineer can completely understand how scary that sentence, in that context really is.
Making a profit is the goal of companies, and I understand that completely, but at what price do the engineer's recommendations become valid? In this case, the price was seven lives.
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