ORANGE CITY, Fla. — Wednesday marks the 40th anniversary of one of the darkest days for NASA — the Space Shuttle Challenger disaster.
All seven astronauts on board were killed when the shuttle broke apart 73 seconds after lifting off from Kennedy Space Center on Jan. 28, 1986.
Many people across Florida and the country watched as it all unfolded, including Volusia County resident Jeffrey Ault, who says he remembers that day like it was yesterday.
Ault was one of many on the shoreline of the Banana River near Port Canaveral who were watching the launch live that day.
He says he was the only person to have shot it all on a Super 8 movie camera.
Although Ault says it was a memorable January day, it was for all the wrong reasons.
Challenger crew members: Michael J. Smith, front row left, Francis R. “Dick” Scobee, Ronald E. McNair; Ellison S. Onizuka, back row left, S. Christa McAuliffe, Gregory B. Jarvis, and Judith A. Resnik. On Jan. 28, 1986, they lost their lives when the space shuttle Challenger blew up after liftoff. (NASA)
Like many space enthusiasts, Ault says he followed the Apollo program and built rocket models ever since he was a kid. So, to witness a tragedy like the Challenger explosion was devastating for him.
It was also his first time seeing a launch in person.
One thing that Ault says he remembers very clearly is how cold it was that day.
He says the launch had been delayed several times because of weather concerns, and that he didn’t know whether it was going to happen.
Even though the Challenger launch resulted in tragedy, Ault says a lot still can be learned from it to this day.
“I think the space program — back with the Apollo program, the Space Shuttle program — brought Americans together, brought people from all over the world together,” he says. “And hopefully, as we move forward, maybe we could get some of that unity and positive feeling back throughout this country.”
Ault says he will never forget the speech that then-President Ronald Reagan made in honor of those who died in the tragedy, and to remind Americans what astronauts put on the line every time they go into space.
“You really have to give credit to the masterminds, the engineers who work on this, and then the brave astronauts that are putting their lives at risk for this travel,” Ault says. “And the Challenger taught us that it is very dangerous.”
To keep their memories alive, the NASA Day of Remembrance ceremony is held every year around the time of the Challenger disaster. This year, it took place on Jan. 22.
The event serves to memorialize the lives lost not only in the Challenger tragedy, but the seven astronauts who died aboard the Space Shuttle Columbia, which broke up during re-entry on Feb. 1, 2003, and the three astronauts from Apollo 1, who died when a fire broke out in their capsule during preflight testing on Jan. 27, 1967.
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