11th grade Chemistry Lab. Teacher had the television on for the class to watch. Was difficult to see. Still remember the teachers initial reaction/comments.

I was in a class for my job, walking out when the instructor said there had been a problem.
That was followed by most people watching the tv for the rest of the day.

I was in 10th grade and we had a TV rolled into the classroom. Such a tragedy.

I was in my final year of my MBA at the University of Chicago. Walked into Stuart Hall lounge where they had a huge back projection TV…. Saw the contrails on the screen, asked another student what it was.

“The space shuttle just blew up.”

“No, really, what is this?”

“I just told you, the space shuttle blew up.”

Seemed impossible at the time.

I was listening on the radio in my office at a major semiconductor manufacturer that supplied components for hardware, including the on-board computers, for the Space Shuttle fleet. As the Space Products Program Manager and Marketing Manager, a few years earlier, I toured the high bay clean room at TRW and saw the TDRS Satellite-B being assembled. That was the main payload on-board that ill-fated mission.

I was in middle school and happened to walk into the school library and they had a tv mounted on the wall behind the librarian’s desk and it was showing what happened. That is how I found out and I was shocked.

quote:

Originally posted by mdblanton:
I was in 10th grade and we had a TV rolled into the classroom. Such a tragedy.

Same here, but I was in the 4th grade.

quote:

Originally posted by ffips:
Wow, I just realized I have had my own "Mandela effect" surrounding this event for the past 40 years. In my memory when this happened, I was in 5th grade watching, with the whole class, on the TV strapped to the rolling cart. I vividly remember this image:


Today as I was thinking about it something was "off." I was actually in the 9th grade when this occurred. Funny how memory works (or fails to without notice)...

edited to add: Apologies for the large image, can't realize easily on my phone.

I remember seeing the disaster on TV as well, live if I remember correctly. That iconic picture still makes me sick to my stomach.

Standing in line at the infantry mess hall at ft. Knox, for lunch

I was in 6th grade and we didn’t watch it but our science teacher a man about 60 then came in with tears in his eyes and told us what had happened. That night on the news it seemed like they showed it over and over.

The Columbia tragedy over Texas seemed worse as it was a weekend. And we watched it and nee it had cracked up and we sat there knowing they were all gone and parts just came back to earth. Seemed more upsetting to me as an almost 30 year old.

I was the supply chain manager for a small NASA contractor near the Goddard Spaceflight Center (GSFC) in Maryland. I don't recall if we had anything on the space shuttle that day. We made small electronic and mechanical subassemblies for a variety of large and small spacecraft, including the small Get Away Special Canisters (GAS Cans) that frequently flew on shuttle flights on a space available basis. It would not have been unusual for some of our equipment to be aboard, integrated with a larger payload or one of the GAS cans. When the news hit, several of us ran down the street to a big screen TV store (big screen TVs were just beginning to be a high value thing). We turned all of the TV's on and tuned each to a different channel or cable news source. A small crowd gathered in the store. We watched the explosion over and over for several hours. Lots of speculation, but no real data to go on.

Much later, it came out that NASA engineers had begged their managers NOT to launch that day. It had been well below freezing overnight and engineers familiar with the properties of the O rings knew they got very stiff when cold. While there were two O rings at each solid rocket booster joint, backed up by some kind of putty, there had been O ring failures on almost every prior shuttle flight. Sometimes more than one O ring failure on a single flight, just not both at a single joint. The failure occurred at thew worst place, next to one of the two attachment points that held the solid rocket booster to the main fuel tank. The plume of fire from the failed joint melted the attachment point, allowing the solid rocket booster to pivot and puncture the main fuel tank. There's no recovery from that. Had the failure occurred at a different joint, or pointed away from anything critical, it might have ended differently.

But those safety concerns didn't convince NASA to delay the flight. Had to stay on schedule. Those decision makers have had to live with the consequences of the decisions they made for the rest of their lives.

I was late in high school. Given our schedule I was finishing lunch and about to head to class. The AV center had one of those big rolling TV stands with a CRT TV and VCR pushed into the doorway so students in the hall could watch the launch.

I walked up just as the shuttle was clearing the tower and watched through the event. I clearly remember the event and many of the students were confused about what had happened. I no question about what had happened and was absolutely stunned.

I don't remember walking to class or much about the rest of that day to be honest.

I was in the Jacksonville, FL, Military Entrance Processing Station (MEPS) swearing into the USAF Delayed Enlistment Program because my guaranteed job wasn’t available at that time. We recruits weren’t allowed to sit in the family lounge where there was a TV, but suddenly all the Military Liaisons poured out of their offices and into the family lounge to watch the news, then came out and announced what had happened.

Growing up in Daytona Beach we saw launches frequently. This one was different as school children across the country were watching on TV, and in our area, outside class or even on the beach, because Christa McAuliffe the “Teacher in Space” was going up. That must have traumatized thousands of children when it blew and the reality of what had occurred hit them.

4 months later my guaranteed job opened and I entered active duty on 28 May 1986. Every year on 28 Jan I remember the Challenger Disaster.

I was at home watching it live before my shift at the Center. Couldn't believe what I saw. I phoned the wife at her work and told her what had happened. It was a very sad day. I had actually met Sally Ride years earlier when she got a weather briefing from us when I worked at Buckley ANGB. She wasn't a very big gal. Watched her just in an F5 and take to the skies.

I was in grad school at U of H, just left the Science & Research building and was passing through the campus’ satellite lounge when I saw it happen.

Not sure how many people remember/know that instead of Christa McAuliffe it was supposed to be Big Bird on the Challenger. NASA was trying to get children interested in space. But the costume was too big to be practical, so they decided to send a teacher instead.