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Challenger explosion explained
Challenger explosion explained
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NASA’s Greatest Downfall: The Challenger Disaster It was a freezing morning on January 28, 1986. Many spectators were waiting anxiously to witness the liftoff of the Challenger space shuttle’s 25th mission. These spectators included thousands of students because Christa McAuliffe was to be the first teacher in space. Tragically, only 73 seconds after liftoff, the Challenger split apart resulting in the death of all 7 members on board. There is evidence that NASA was aware of issues that could have potentially complicated the scheduled liftoff, but NASA fatally decided to proceed with the mission. Because of NASA’s negligence and the loss of 7 lives, the Challenger mission of January 1986 was one of the greatest failures of NASA. The Challenger experienced multiple delays before finally launching on January 28th. During the week of January 26th, the rescheduled liftoff after 5 delays, temperature projections were unusually low ranging from 26 degrees to 29 degrees in Florida where the shuttle launching was to take place (Robison et al 62). This created concern for NASA and Morton Thiokol, the company where the rocket boosters for the Challenger were made, regarding the functionality of the rocket boosters. Morton Thiokol engineers cautioned the company to delay the launch, so they contacted NASA and explained their concerns. Eager to accomplish the launch, NASA asked Morton Thiokol to reassess the issues. Morton Thiokol and NASA had a meeting, with exclusion of the engineers, regarding the low temperatures. Without the engineers’ vocal opinions in the meeting, the managers of Morton Thiokol consented for NASA to proceed with the launch of Challenger on January (Robison et al 62). However, the scheduled launch was once again de... ... middle of paper ... ... n.d. Web. 28 Apr. 2014. Kelley, Carey, Nick Lopez, Michael Salinas, and Gabriel Garcia. "The Challenger Disaster - What Really Happened!." YouTube. CFKSite, 28 May 2008. Web. 28 Apr. 2014. "Letter from Joseph Kerwin to Richard Truly, July 28, 1986." Gale U.S. History in Context. Detroit: Gale, 2012. Student Resources in Context. Web. 23 Apr. 2014. McDonald, Virginian-Pilot/AP. "5 Myths of Challenger Shuttle Disaster Debunked." National Geographic. National Geographic Society, 27 Jan. 2011. Web. 29 Apr. 2014. Robison, Wade, Roger Boisjoly, David Hoeker, and Stefan Young. "Representation and Misrepresentation: Tufte and the Morton Thiokol Engineers on the Challenger." Science and Engineering Ethics 2002: 59-81. Web. 29 Apr. 2014. "Roger Boisjoly, Engineer Who Warned of Challenger Shuttle Disaster, Dies at 73." Space.com. Space.com, 9 Feb. 2012. Web. 28 Apr. 2014.
On a cold winter’s morning on the 28th day of January in the year 1986, America was profoundly shaken and sent to its knees as the space shuttle Challenger gruesomely exploded just seconds after launching. The seven members of its crew, including one civilian teacher, were all lost. This was a game changer, we had never lost a single astronaut in flight. The United States by this time had unfortunately grown accustomed to successful space missions, and this reality check was all too sudden, too brutal for a complacent and oblivious nation (“Space”). The outbreak of sympathy that poured from its citizens had not been seen since President John F. Kennedy’s assassination. The disturbing scenes were shown repeatedly on news networks which undeniably made it troublesome to keep it from haunting the nation’s cognizance (“Space”). The current president had more than situation to address, he had the problematic undertaking of gracefully picking America back up by its boot straps.
New York: Charles Scribner's Sons, 2001. Student Resources in Context. Web. The Web. The Web. 6 Mar. 2014.
Although the design flaws that contributed to the Challenger and Columbia accidents were different, the accidents themselves were similar. The CAIB during the investigation of the root causes of the accidents, identified contributing organizational problems that played a factored in both cases. NASA had received early warnings of safety issues, however, they failed to take them seriously and resolve them. “What we find out from [a] comparison between Columbia and Challenger is that NASA as an organization did not learn from its previous mistakes and it did not properly address all of the factors that the presidential commission identified.” - Dr. Diane Vaughan.
Web. The Web. The Web. 19 Apr. 2014. The 'Standard' of the 'Standard'.
On the morning of Tuesday, January 28th, 1986, it was a normal day for the citizens and children of America. Although this may have been a normal day most of the nation’s televisions were set to watch the National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA) set a new milestone with its space shuttle the Challenger. During this time space exploration was very important in the American culture. The Challenger shuttle had a crew of seven men and women, including a teacher Christa McAuliffe from the space program. On this Tuesday morning most of America watched and listen as the twenty fifth shuttle mission took off with what was thought to be no complications. A short time of seventy three seconds after the shuttle was launched, a fire broke out and the space shuttle exploded. Landing in the ocean, all that remained was two smoking rocket boosters of what use to be the Challenger.
The U.S. Centennial of Flight Commission detailed that the launch took place on January 28, 1986 at Kennedy Space Center in Florida. The skis about Kennedy Space Center were clear and the sun was out in the sky. However the day was very cold the temperature was only slightly above freezing. This launch was going to be the coldest that NASA had ever launched before. The time of lift off was 11:38 AM Eastern Standard Time, this was when the 25th shuttle mission lifted off and headed towards space.
The temperature on the morning of the launch was unusually cold and engineers warned supervisors that components, such as the O-rings which sealed rocket booster joints, were subject to failure at low temperatures. From NASA supervisors and managers, to the company that designed the rocket boosters, these warnings and vulnerabilities were ignored, minimized, and excused. Similarly, as was the case with the Vasa, the King pressed and pressed on the shipbuilders to hasten the construction of the Vasa, when resources and materials were their most constrained, including the master shipbuilders themselves, not part of the major portion of construction effort. To wit, Admiral Fleming had to conduct the stability test in their absence and he is on record as having stated “the shipbuilder has built ships before”, in an attempt to excuse and wave off the Boatswain’s warnings that the ship was too narrow at its bottom to be stable under way. As well, Fleming wished the King, himself, had witnessed the test, himself likely believing this was the only way to convey the potential risk of proceeding with the vessel’s launch under rushed conditions, literally pieced together in haste with the wrong sized materials because the correct lumber pieces were not on hand to construct it according to the Kings numerous design revisions. The King didn’t care and no one dared to make him. The result, like as in the three cases to which the Vasa has been herein compared, was a preventable disaster, but for leadership’s negative influence and the “it’s safer to be silent” culture it seemed to imbue in
On February 1, 2003, the Space Shuttle Columbia was lost due to structural failure in the left wing. On take-off, it was reported that a piece of foam insulation surrounding the shuttle fleet's 15-story external fuel tanks fell off of Columbia's tank and struck the shuttle's left wing. Extremely hot gas entered the front of Columbia's left wing just 16 seconds after the orbiter penetrated the hottest part of Earth's atmosphere on re-entry. The shuttle was equipped with hundreds of temperature sensors positioned at strategic locations. The salvaged flight recorded revealed that temperatures started to rise in the left wing leading edge a full minute before any trouble on the shuttle was noted. With a damaged left wing, Columbia started to drag left. The ships' flight control computers fought a losing battle trying to keep Columbia's nose pointed forward.
After the bombers of Flight 19 had disappeared, the US Navy immediately sent out a search party for the lost crew. Two PBM Mariner flying boats were sent out in search of the crew of Flight 19, but shortly after their departure one plane had already gone missing. The plane had been reported as seemingly following the path that had been taken by Flight 19. The crew of thirteen on the Mariner was never found, but it was believed that the plane had exploded shortly after departure. The theory was proven shortly after when a merchant ship that was passing by reported seeing a fireball in the sky followed by oil in the ocean.
N.p., 1 Nov. 2011. Web. The Web. The Web. 29 Nov. 2011.
On January 28, 1986, the United States experienced a national disaster that will long be remembered as a dark day for our nation’s space program and for our nation in general. On its tenth flight, the Space Shuttle Challenger broke apart 73 seconds after take-off, killing all seven members on board. The spacecraft disintegrated over the Atlantic Ocean. Americans had been eagerly anticipating watching the launch on live TV because one of the shuttle’s crew members was a school teacher. She would have been the first teacher to have traveled in space, so there was a lot of media covering the event. The Space Shuttle Challenger accident was such a tragedy that one study reported about 85 percent of Americans surveyed had heard the news within one hour (and this was even before the advent of social media and the internet). The Challenger disaster has been used as a case study in many discussions of safety in engineering. After nine successful missions, what went wrong on the Challenger’s 10th mission, and what has been learned from this accident from an engineering perspective to make space travel safer in the future?
The. Web. The Web. The Web. 14 May 2014. Horng, Eric.