When I think of it, I remember being at our first business, watching it up on the TV screen, and wondering, what the hell happened. The though of terrorism or sabotage was very far from our minds, as my husband and I looked at what was happening. Being in a mechanically orientated kind of business, we were on the page of what failed, not who did it.
I had never been to a launch site and didn't know much about space, only that I lived in an age where this was possible and men had walked on the moon. Later I would realize just how far we had come and how TV shows like Star Trek really heralded a new era. All that gadgetry on TV drawn from some very creative minds, would come to be in many ways a part of our future. The world I grew up in, with all its fantasy about space travel would be the world I live in today.
When I met June Scobee Rodgers, I could feel a presence about her. Here was a woman who had lived through something unthinkable, something that would only be perhaps paled as we would live through other disasters, like the Twin Towers September 11, 2001 and the Columbia Space Shuttle which broke up in re-entry on February 1, 2003. In a way it reminds me of the Great War, WWI which was supposed to be the war that ended all wars, then it was followed by WWII. Which tragedy is worse? They were all terrible. This one however, stole more than a bit of innocence, as the Apollo 1 disaster 19 years and day before on January 27, 1967. It too shocked the nation as three astronauts burned up in their tiny capsule, Grissom, White and Chaffee, brave men each in their own right.
June was attending a launch party for the Challenger Museum in February 2000, just before my election. Back then our area was getting a Challenger Learning Center. When it was built my children had the opportunity to participate in a mission launch and take various roles to understand how a mission worked. That night, I met June and bought one of her books which was used to raise funds for the Challenger Learning Centers. There are now 48 of these centers in our nation. I am happy that June was successful and able to work through her grief in this very positive way.
The Challenger Mission was the first to include a teacher in space. Christa McAuliffe was the last person to submit an application for this very unique opportunity, the Teacher in Space Project. In her application essay in 1984, she wrote, " I cannot join the space program and restart my life as an astronaut, but this opportunity to connect my abilities as an educator with my interests in history and space is a unique opportunity to fulfill my early fantasies. I watched the space program being born, and I would like to participate."
She was selected. She prepared lessons and was eager to put her teacher hat on for all the kids all over the world. Perhaps her joy in teaching has been best honored by the mission of the Challenger Centers. Time provides us all with perspective and understanding of the events of the past. This retrospection gives us an energy with which to view the future. What has been done, what has been accomplished has not be without tragedy and pain, but the glimpse of the future that each of these events sought to provide, what each provided in the way of a stepping stone of progress for us as a people, as a nation, well, we are grateful.
The book June wrote is rather remarkable. It goes through the whole process of the event and how each step seemed to be on a path. The interesting thing is how Dick Scobee left a message in his briefcase before the launch which was found later. It said: "We have whole planets to explore. We have new worlds to build. We have a solar system to roam in. And if only a tiny fraction of the human race reaches out toward space, the work they do there will totally change the lives of all the billions of humans who remain on earth, just at the strivings of a handful of colonists in the new world totally changed the lives of everyone in Europe, Asia, and Africa."
What June said about the note; "Had Dick left the note in his briefcase for us to find if something happened? Did he write it on scratch paper to use to quote in a speech? All we'll ever know is that when we most needed a message, it was there. He left for us his dream for the world, his vision for space exploration." *
*from Silver Linings by June Scobee Rodgers.
Copyright 2011 by SheilaTGTG55
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Touching story on such a blessed day.
rated with hugs
I often wonder if Challenger had never disintegrated, what kind of a space program we would have today. There was so much hope tied up in that mission. It was a tragic day for all of us, but especially the families of those 7.
Thank you again.
Hydrogen fuel cell cars? Space program, along with everything from hydroponics to hearing aids!
Bring the space program back!
It always struck me as amazing that Onizuka's grandparents arrived in Hawaii on sailing ships, and he died in a space ship.
At the zoo in Hilo they planted a remembrance garden for the Challenger seven, and there were memorials to Russian astronauts who had died as well as the Challenger and Apollo 1 dead. I remember a conversation with some bigots who were incensed at their inclusion, where I managed to convince them that space is like the ocean - it's all of us against the void when you're out there, and national and political considerations don't count.
I also recall how enraged I was when I discovered what a culture of complacency, and downright bad design, had led to the Challenger disaster. I read the whole report from cover to cover, and sat and wept tears of rage in my office.
My grandfather and grandmother were visiting us in Heidelberg. I can remember the sobs wracking him. The rest of us were just in shock, but my granddad understood the loss immediately. He had the beginnings of dementia at the time, but it still got through to him first.
And so it's right that we think about Challenger every January 28th. But that does not mean we shouldn't spare a thought for Apollo 1 every January 27 too. Grissom was a pioneer — a two-time space veteran who was the second American in space and commanded the first Gemini mission. White was a skywalker — literally — the first American to leave his spacecraft and float tethered in the void above the planet. Chaffee was a fighter, a Naval pilot who, before he joined NASA, was flying reconnaissance missions over Cuba during the powder keg days of the 1962 missile crisis.
And for what it's worth, the men did suffer. The Apollo 1 cockpit tape has always been kept under tight security, locked inside a sort of vault within a vault in the NASA archives. One day, however, many years ago, someone with the proper clearance checked the recording out and then, when trying to return it, misrouted it through office mail. The tape landed on the desk of an agency official I knew who has since passed away. The official recognized what was in front of him immediately and stared at it, torn between the noble impulse to return the thing straightaway and the entirely human impulse to listen to it first. He was human, and so he gave in.
"That was no two seconds," he told me much later. "No two seconds at all."
Read more: http://www.time.com/time/health/article/0,8599,2044930,00.html#ixzz1CNMNH33U
I'm not always sure I want us to make it off the planet, but if we want to survive as a species we better get to work.
It's tragic we've had to watch so many terrible things happen before our eyes. June Scobee Rodgers brings renewed inspiration.
Thank you for this,
rated
Furthermore, shooting people into space has always seemed an extravagant and even frivolous use of resources. I can't say the manned space program has done anything to enrich my life or that of my family. It seems trite to ponder how many new teachers we could have hired and trained for the cost of shooting one into space, and yet, it's not an insignificant matter.
Maybe the Challenger mishap - echoes of Icarus, showmanship over substance, good people screwed by a military contractor - is an apt metaphor for America.
We were having dinner in the White Swan Hotel, Guangzhou/Canton, China and Chinese people told us. Back in our room there, we were able to get CNN's coverage.
r
♥
I always recall where I was at death.
I remember Diana's death in a tunnel.
I recall Mother Theresa died that week.
Dad died when Diana and Theresa died.
I recall this sad fact ref Ron Reagan's crew.
Reagan was to give a 'chat' & wanted a launch.
The speechwriters wanted the rocket to be fired.
The politicos in DC pushed for the risky go ahead.
I realize the death of my Father, Mother Theresa,
Lady Diana etc., (same week) was different. So sad.
I recall the pressure to postpone the launch. Ignored.
The powers-that-be wanted to hoopla at R.R. speech.
The Trickle Down Thinker Theory. Stockman's team.
sigh
so sad
wonder
How do these ilk-type of creeps sleep? Oh, what misery.
I'd not thought about where I was for years. Wood shop.
I should`
go build`
a coffin`
it be cool.
hide wine.
whine box.
store booze.
dovetail box.
make real big.
big for clowns.
size 13- shoo pie.
eat pie and shoes.
fill coffin box ups.
eat in heaven box.
goofy. nice snows.
snow shoo scoops.
Thank Ya - Sheila.
The negligence and disfunctional organization that later came to light were appalling.
Julie: I missed the comment earlier about your granddad and Heidelberg, that must have been very hard to witness, to understand that it was painful and your granddad knew it strongly.
Art: Thank you for gracing us with your words here. They are telling and I understand.
Abrawang: I completely understand what you are saying here. When I met June I did not feel the dysfunctional aspects just a woman working through her grief her personal tragedy, and trying to make sense of her loss and that of their children. I feel daily the pain of so much that is done wrong and wrong done. For me, I am disturbed greatly by the greed, and hurried nature of things, the brokenness of our governments and our greed. All of this was a part in a way of this tragedy too and many others.
I was in my office in Baltimore that day when I heard.
Glad you remembered. / R
A well-deserved EP.
A wonderful tribute, Sheila. Congratulations on the EP my friend.
Kate: Thank you for stopping. I started thinking about it and how June was that night. She spoke as though we had known each other a million years and that itself was worth remembering too.
I gasped, and tried not to believe what I'd seen. And then, I heard, from the reporters on screen, the awful confirmation.
I still shiver whenever I think back to that...
And then, life goes on, whether we wish it to or not, and everything becomes not distant, but somehow, buried under layers of new events.
Thank you for making us stop and remember.
After the meeting I went to a snack bar. They had a TV on. Naturally, all eyes were glued to it. That's how I found out. I flashed back to hearing of the horrific Apollo 1 disaster, and the nail-biting cliffhanger that was Apollo 13.
And I wept for those 7 astronauts. This kind of thing wasn't supposed to happen.
See also: http://boingboing.net/2010/02/08/challenger-space-shu.html
Muse: Thank you Muse. Thank you for visiting. It was a very difficult experience for people with kids watching it, I am sure.