Sharon Christa McAuliffe was an American teacher and astronaut from Concord, New Hampshire who died on the Space Shuttle Challenger on mission STS-51-L, where she was serving as a payload specialist.
Ronald Erwin McNair was an American NASA astronaut and physicist. He died at the age of 35 during the launch of the Space Shuttle Challenger on mission STS-51-L, in which he was serving as one of three mission specialists in a crew of seven.
Gregory Bruce Jarvis was an American engineer and astronaut who died during the destruction of the Space Shuttle Challenger on mission STS-51-L, where he was serving as payload specialist for Hughes Aircraft.
Ellison Shoji Onizuka was an American astronaut, engineer, and U.S. Air Force flight test engineer from Kealakekua, Hawaii, who successfully flew into space with the Space Shuttle Discovery on STS-51-C. He died in the destruction of the Space Shuttle Challenger, on which he was serving as Mission Specialist for mission STS-51-L. Onizuka was the first Asian American and the first person of Japanese origin to reach space.
Francis Richard Scobee was an American pilot, engineer, and astronaut. He was killed while commanding the Space Shuttle Challenger in 1986, which suffered catastrophic booster failure during launch of the STS-51-L mission.
On January 28, 1986, the Space Shuttle Challenger broke apart 73 seconds into its flight, killing all seven crew members aboard. The spacecraft disintegrated 46,000 feet (14 km) above the Atlantic Ocean, off the coast of Cape Canaveral, Florida, at 11:39 a.m. EST. It was the first fatal accident involving an American spacecraft while in flight.
The Teacher in Space Project (TISP) was a NASA program announced by Ronald Reagan in 1984 designed to inspire students, honor teachers, and spur interest in mathematics, science, and space exploration. The project would carry teachers into space as Payload Specialists, who would return to their classrooms to share the experience with their students.
Barbara Radding Morgan is an American teacher and a former NASA astronaut. She participated in the Teacher in Space program as backup to Christa McAuliffe for the 1986 ill-fated STS-51-L mission of the Space Shuttle Challenger. She then trained as a mission specialist, and flew on STS-118 in August 2007. She is the first teacher to have been to space.
The year 1986 in science and technology involved many significant events, some not listed below.
3352 McAuliffe, provisional designation 1981 CW, is a rare-type asteroid and suspected binary system, classified as near-Earth object of the Amor group, approximately 2 kilometers in diameter. It was discovered on 6 February 1981, by American astronomer Norman Thomas at Lowell's Anderson Mesa Station near Flagstaff, Arizona, United States.
Expedition 9 (2004) was the ninth expedition to the International Space Station.
The Space Mirror Memorial, which forms part of the larger Astronauts Memorial, is a National Memorial on the grounds of the John F. Kennedy Space Center Visitor Complex on Merritt Island, Florida. It is maintained by the Astronauts Memorial Foundation (AMF), whose offices are located in the NASA Center for Space Education next door to the Visitor Complex. The memorial was designed in 1987 by Holt Hinshaw Pfau Jones, and dedicated on May 9, 1991, to remember the lives of the men and women who have died in the various space programs of the United States, particularly those of NASA. The Astronauts Memorial has been designated by the U.S. Congress "as the national memorial to astronauts who die in the line of duty".
Roger Mark Boisjoly was an American mechanical engineer, fluid dynamicist, and an aerodynamicist. He is best known for having raised strenuous objections to the launch of the Space Shuttle Challenger months before the loss of the spacecraft and its crew in January 1986. Boisjoly correctly predicted, based on earlier flight data, that the O-rings on the rocket boosters would fail if the shuttle launched in cold weather. Morton Thiokol's managers decided to launch the shuttle despite his warnings, leading to the catastrophic failure. He was considered a high-profile whistleblower.
STS-51-L was the disastrous 25th mission of NASA's Space Shuttle program and the final flight of Space Shuttle Challenger.
Southwest Independent School District is a public school district located in southwestern Bexar County, Texas, United States.
3350 Scobee, provisional designation 1980 PJ, is a stony Florian asteroid from the inner regions of the asteroid belt, approximately 3 kilometers in diameter. It was discovered on 8 August 1980 by American astronomer Edward Bowell at Lowell's Anderson Mesa Station near Flagstaff, Arizona. It was named for Dick Scobee, commander of the ill-fated Challenger crew.
The Challenger is a 2013 TV movie starring William Hurt about Richard Feynman's investigation into the 1986 Space Shuttle Challenger disaster. The film was co-produced by the BBC, the Science Channel, and Open University, and it premiered on 12 May 2013 on BBC2.
Phaethon is a symphonic poem by the American composer Christopher Rouse. The work was commissioned in celebration of the United States Bicentennial by the Philadelphia Orchestra with contributions from Johnson & Higgins. It was completed on February 22, 1986, and was given its world premiere at the Academy of Music in Philadelphia by the Philadelphia Orchestra under the direction of Riccardo Muti on January 8, 1987. It is dedicated in memory of the crew of the Space Shuttle Challenger, which broke apart on the morning of January 28, 1986 while Rouse was composing the piece. Since its premiere, Phaethon has become one of Rouse's most popular orchestral compositions.
Their Spirits Circle the Earth, also known as Challenger Memorial, is an outdoor memorial and sculpture commemorating victims of the Space Shuttle Challenger disaster by Jim Mason, installed in Columbus, Ohio's Battelle Riverfront Park, in the United States.
