#shuttle program

Early Program Development

"As part of the Space Task Group's recommendations for more commonality and integration in America's space program, Marshall Space Flight Center engineers proposed an orbiting propellant storage facility to augment Space Shuttle missions. In this artist's concept from 1969 an early version of the Space Shuttle is shown refueling at the facility."

Date: 1969

Photo Credit: NASA, Russian Space Research Institute

The fate of the Space Shuttle Challenger is told in the massive fireball it ended up in and is a warning of the dangers of mixing rocket engineering with social engineering.

San Francisco, CA - On the 32nd anniversary of the Challenger disaster, NASA finally comes to terms with the high price for using its precious space shuttles for political agendas. On January 28, 1986, the NASA Space Shuttle Challenger broke apart 73 seconds into flight, killing all seven crew members on board, including a schoolteacher and only the second black astronaut in history at that time, Ronald McNair. After the investigation, NASA concluded that an O-ring seal in the space shuttle's right solid rocket booster had failed at liftoff and that it was never designed to fly under extremely cold conditions. The morning of January 28 was particularly cold and the mission of the Challenger was politically significant, carrying not only a female schoolteacher, but the second black astronaut in U.S. history. But the Challenger mission was doomed from the start.

RELATED: NASA CUTS BLACK ASTRONAUT FROM SPACE MISSION FOR LACK OF SKILL

Challenger was originally set to launch from Cape Canaveral on January 22, 1986, but delays in the previous mission caused the launch date to be rolled back to January 23 and then January 24. But bad weather at the Transoceanic Abort Landing site in Dakar, Senegal, which is in west Africa, caused the launch to be pushed back again to January 25. Bad weather at Cape Canaveral on January 26 scotched the launch to January 27, but problems with an exterior access hatch and a stripped bolt on the Challenger pushed the launch to January 28. Forecasts for January 28 put temperatures at the usually balmy Kennedy Space Center at an unusually frigid 30 degrees Fahrenheit - the absolute minimum permitted for launch, with the Challenger never having been certified to launch at such low temperatures.

Russia looked from his paperwork at his vibrating phone. There was a sunny blond, smiling, displayed there, tagged with the name America. He tilted his head in confusion. Why would America be calling me now? It’s almost three in the morning there, he thought to himself.

Regardless, he picked up the small device, answering it and putting it on speaker so he could continue his work while they spoke. “Russia speaking.”

“Russia!” he sobbed into the phone, “What am I going to do? The very last flight landed again today and, and,” he broke his string of dialogue with a hiccup before continuing. “Oh god, what am I going to do? Thirty years, Ivan. Thirty. Years. Of space exploration with these beautiful crafts. How am I supposed to keep sending astronauts to the Space Station without them?”

The Russian listened to him lament about the end of the Space Shuttle program, sympathy lacing his features. “I remember hearing about that, Fedya. You treasured that program, didn’t you?”

There was a pause on the other end, filled only with the sound of sloshing liquid, before America spoke again. “Yeah, I guess you could say that.”

“Can I video call you so we can talk better?” he asked tentatively. Their connection was spotty and he didn’t want to miss anything that the other said. When America gave his consent, he ended the call and pulled up his computer, opening his program and searching through his contacts, clicking on the right one and waiting for the other to accept.

He didn’t wait long, for Alfred’s face appeared almost immediately, illuminated by the light coming from his moniter screen. He could see the moon, half full, through the huge glass wall behind him.

“So, how’ve you been lately?” Alfred slurred, crossing his arms on his desk and resting his chin atop them.

The first thing he noticed was that the American was not wearing his glasses. Second was the bottle of Everclear off to the side of the frame, only visible enough to be able to tell what it was, but he couldn’t see how much was left inside of it.

So, he posed a question of his own. “Where are your glasses?” Alfred brought a hand up to his face, clearly unaware that the thin wire frames were missing.

“I… I don’t know.” He laughed darkly. “I guess I really just can’t see and I’m not nearly s drunk as I thought.”

“How much have you had?”

Alfred looked at the bottle off camera, picking it up and swirling the rest of the liquid around before finishing off the bottle. “This is my second bottle, I think.”

Russia sighed, drumming his fingers on his keyboard. “That should have killed you.”

“I wish it had killed me,” he grumbled back. “At least it’s better than your sissy vodka that you drink all the time, what with it’s average 40-88%. Poland came up with a stupid fuckin,” he stopped abruptly, looking like he was going to pass out, then continued, “96% spirit. It has some ridiculous name that I can’t remember. Maybe I’ll hit him up for some sometime…”

“Alfred, you should not drink like this. I am concerned for you.”

He shook off the words. “I don’t usually. No, I save this kind o’ stuff for the special occasions.”

“Like having one of your favorite endeavors canceled?” Ivan rested his head on a hand, all other work abandoned for the time being.

“It’s more than that,” he whispered, “I worked so hard on that, for years. I started out so small, Vanya. So small. And I was trying to keep up with you, and all you did was throw a metal beach ball into orbit. Then you sent a guy up there and, and I just had to be more; do better than you ever could. And this,” he motioned around him at an imaginary lab; a command center that was far, far away. “This did it. I was finally better than my last competitor. I couldn’t be beat. I conqered the sky, then I took the cosmos. I did everything that everyone said I couldn’t do.”

“And it’s just as much a part of you as your thirst for true freedom,” Russia conclded for him. “I know what you mean.”

There was silence between them, but it was not awkward or unwelcome. It was understanding. A void that filled itself with thoughts and memories, opposed to words.

After a while, however, a voice made itself known again. “Would you like to go stargazing again sometime?”