Challenger exploded during launch twenty years ago today. I still have the newspaper around somewhere from the day after.
I kind of compare that day to the day of the Kennedy assassination my parents' generation had. One of those "where were you" things. I was in my science class in grade nine. At that point, we didn't watch shuttle launches in school anymore because it was just "normal" and not very newsworthy. That kind of bothered me, because I was rally into the space program through most of my childhood. The first shuttle launch several years early really captured my imagination. It still does, and it bothers me that nobody cares anymore about NASA or space exploration.
My teacher, Ms. Smith, a crabby woman but someone with her heart in the right place, was late to class. That was fairly unusual because she was such a hard ass all of the time. I remember that room particularly well because it had been renovated, and most of Whitney M. Young Junior High was aging. It had more of a new construction smell than a nasty old science lab.
When Ms. Smith came into the room, she had a very serious look on her face, like something was up. She said she had some bad news.
"The Space Shuttle... blew up."
My first reaction was that she was joking or just heard wrong. No way... I knew the craft and the launch process too well, and I just didn't think it was possible. I didn't pay attention much the rest of the day in class, and when I got home I rushed to the TV to find out what really happened.
I read the news paper nearly every day and watched ABC News almost every night. Much later we'd learn that the O-rings that sealed the joints in the solid rocket boosters failed and that caused the ignition of the fuel tank. It angered me that something so stupid caused the accident.
The more recent Columbia accident was very sad as well. I went to a hockey game that day, and it was hard to do that. I felt like a part of my childhood died that day in a way, because that was the first shuttle to orbit the Earth.
It's hard to say what will become of space exploration. It seems hard to justify the expense when there's so much shit going on here down on the planet, despite the many innovations that have come out of experiments in zero-gravity. I guess the idealist in me still thinks that the pursuit of science is a noble goal.