Challenger – Spaceflight Now

Video: 31 years since Challenger tragedy

January 28, 2017 Justin Ray

President Reagan addressed the nation with this speech 31 years ago today, following the loss of the space shuttle Challenger and crew on Jan. 28, 1986.

STS 41-B Post-Flight Presentation

March 1, 2016 Spaceflight Now

The crew of Space Shuttle mission STS 41-B provide an overview of their mission. Challenger launched from the Kennedy Space Center on February 3, 1984, and although the flight was marred by the failure of two commercial satellite deployments, astronaut Bruce McCandless made history by making the first untethered spacewalk using the Manned Maneuvering Unit jet pack.

Families, NASA honor fallen astronauts

January 28, 2016 William Harwood

On the 30th anniversary of the Challenger disaster, crew families, friends and space workers gathered Thursday to remember the 17 men and women who lost their lives on the high frontier, 14 in two space shuttle disasters and three in an Apollo-era launch pad fire 49 years ago Wednesday.

OTD…Jan. 28 and STS-51L

January 28, 2016 Justin Ray

Today in 1986…Space shuttle Challenger and her seven astronaut crew were lost during launch.

Reporters remember Challenger coverage

January 27, 2016 William Harwood

Veteran CBS News correspondent Bruce Hall was not on the air when the shuttle Challenger blasted off 30 years ago Thursday. It was, after all, the 25th shuttle flight, the first of 16 planned for 1986, and news agencies were backing off expensive, remote coverage of what increasingly appeared to be a routine event.

Challenger remembered

January 26, 2016 William Harwood

Thirty years after the space shuttle Challenger disintegrated in the clear, cold sky high above Cape Canaveral, the commander’s widow no longer feels anger at NASA and the management missteps and schedule pressure that kept the orbiters flying despite a fatal flaw in their solid-fuel boosters.

The Space Shuttle Challenger Accident Investigation

January 23, 2016 Spaceflight Now

A NASA video on the investigation into the Challenger accident of January 28, 1986. The video was created by the STS 51-L Data and Design Analysis Task Force which contributed to the Presidential Commission that investigated the tragedy. (Membership required)

Shuttle memorial honors crews, orbiters

June 27, 2015 William Harwood

In the first memorial of its kind, NASA and the families of the 14 men and women who lost their lives aboard the shuttle Challenger in 1986 and Columbia in 2003 have joined together to remember the astronauts with pictures, personal mementos and, in an emotional first, iconic wreckage from both orbiters.