The Space Shuttle Challenger Accident Investigation

This video from a camera on Atlantis’ flight deck shows what it’s like to launch into orbit aboard the space shuttle. The footage begins with the final countdown to blastoff and continues through the astronauts getting out of their seats to see the jettisoned fuel tank fall away. (Membership Required)

Sixty years ago Monday, a 27-year-old Russian test pilot named Yuri Gagarin strapped into a Vostok capsule in Central Asia and rode into orbit atop a launcher derived from a Soviet nuclear missile, becoming the first human to travel into the void of space. Twenty years later, in 1981, the era of reusable spacecraft dawned with the first launch of NASA’s space shuttle.

The museum-bound space shuttle tank is coming ashore this morning in Marina del Rey, California, for offloading from its transport barge.