Warbird Information Exchange

I think that you are right about that, but man that is something that should not be locked away.

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Chris Henry
EAA Aviation Museum Director

A lot of people feel that some part of Challenger should be on display. This was a historical spacecraft afterall that carried the first American woman into space and saw the first untethered spacewalk.

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"Everyone wants to live here (New Jersey), evidenced by the fact that it has the highest population per capita in the U.S..."

I don't think it would be a bad idea. We should be brave enough to learn from our history. These artifacts could be used to display the danger in space flight.

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Chris Henry
EAA Aviation Museum Director

http://www.floridatoday.com/columbia/challenger.swf

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"Everyone wants to live here (New Jersey), evidenced by the fact that it has the highest population per capita in the U.S..."

It was is very sad stuff. There are alot of emotions there. I remember that I was not in school yet, I was 5, andcan remeber clear as day watching it with my mom. When the explosions took place, I didn't know what happened, but I knew that itwas not right. Very sad. I am sure that all of us have our own memories of that, just like 9/11.

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Chris Henry
EAA Aviation Museum Director

Some interesting (and sad) stuff on Challenger...

http://www.aerospaceweb.org/question/in ... 0122.shtml

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"Everyone wants to live here (New Jersey), evidenced by the fact that it has the highest population per capita in the U.S..."

Challengers final landing...

http://science.ksc.nasa.gov/mirrors/ima ... 062521.jpg

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"Everyone wants to live here (New Jersey), evidenced by the fact that it has the highest population per capita in the U.S..."

You're right, the two Orbiter disasters were "Kennedy moments" for sure. I was born in 1965...so the news of the Challenger explosion taught me what people felt like on 22 November 1963. (I was in college at the time, nearing the end of the Print Journalism program; there was a TV on a cart in one of the classrooms, a class member named Christine suddenly came tearing into the room and shouted "turn the TV on, the Space Shuttle just blew up"...and for the remainder of the day we were riveted.)

I remember exactly how I heard about the Columbia tragedy too, and, of course, 9/11, which overshadows pretty much any other news I've ever received. After Challenger's loss I actually "vented" by writing a short poem (which I won't inflict on WIX even if I could remember it all!)...

But as far as the Orbiter program goes, I remember something else even better: tuning in to CBS one day in 1981 and watching Columbia launch for the first time. It was stupendous: apparently they'd overestimated the needed amount of cooling water below the pad, and the resulting steam cloud looked like a thunderhead; then the cloud started to glow, and out the top rose Columbia atop her column of fire. It was the most triumphant-looking thing I had ever seen, and remains one of the few things the memory of which still chokes me up slightly years--decades, now--later. But the best part was that I wasn't alone in being awestruck by the sight: famous veteran news anchor Dan Rather, who was hosting the Columbia launch broadcast, was just as poleaxed and tonguetied after the launch, not being quite able to compose himself...it was hilarious, and oddly touching too. That's what I recall best about the Shuttles, and that's what I prefer to remember them by. Strange to think of them in museums, passed into history just like the Warbirds we all love...

S.

Actually they underestimated the amount of sound suppression water they would need under the pad. The resulting "shock-wave" moved the body flap on Columbia to the breaking point. Astronaut John Young has been quoted as saying had he known about the damage, he would have aborted the flight after solid rocket booster burn-out and performed a dangerous return to launch site abort landing rather than continuing on to orbit...

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"Everyone wants to live here (New Jersey), evidenced by the fact that it has the highest population per capita in the U.S..."

I have to agree. NASA is all about the perfection. It's part of the mentality that drives it's divorce rate and causes other issues as well. I think, sadly, that the anal retentive attitude is going to have to change before NASA can resume it's place in the American Psyche. Without loosing the quailty (which has degreaded along with it's puplic attention)

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"I knew the jig was up when I saw the P-51D-20-NA Mustang blue-nosed bastards from Bodney, and by the way the blue was more of a royal blue than an indigo and the inner landing gear interiors were NOT green, over Berlin."