Pilot Mike Smith was selected as an astronaut candidate in 1980 and was set to make his first spaceflight on Challenger's STS-51L mission. Smith was also assigned to pilot the future space shuttle mission 61-N, which at the time was scheduled to launch in the fall of 1986. An official ...
After multiple delays,Challengerblasted off on mission STS-51L at 11:38 a.m. EST on Jan. 28, 1986. It was the second of 16 missions planned for 1986 as the space agency struggled to meet a brutal schedule that included the back-to-back launches in May, five days apart, of two plane...
After Challenger Shuttle operations were suspended for almost three years and the SRB field joint redesigned. In the final chapter Vaughan commented that while risk mitigating actions and improvements had taken place, in 1996…: NASA is again experiencing the economic strain that prevailed at the tim...
Challenger's ill-fated flight, STS-51L, gained wide attention because of the presence of New Hampshire high school teacher Christa McAuliffe on the shuttle's crew as NASA's first Teacher in Space. She was joined by Challenger mission commander Richard "Dick" Scobee, pilot Michael J. Smith,...