jkw@lanl.ARPA (01/28/86)
A few minutes ago, I wandered into a packed meeting room down the hall from my
office where a bunch of people were watching the Challenger lift-off on a
big screen TV. When it EXPLODED, I felt like I had been kicked in the guts.
The silence in the room was deafening. A few minutes later, someone told
me that some of the people in the meeting room were a shuttle crew here for
a briefing about an instrument to be taken up on a launch (formerly)
scheduled for later this spring. How do you suppose they felt? They
immediately scrambled for Houston.
I can't imagine the emotions experienced by the families of the astronauts,
not to mention those of the kids at the Cape watching their schoolteacher
being vaporized. I feel a lot like I did when JFK was shot.
I think that Joe Tourist joyrides have just slipped a little farther into the
future. I fervently hope that the anti-space types in Washington won't be
able to completely kill the shuttle program and that a few years from now we
will look back on this as we now do on the Apollo fire -- as an unfortunate
misstep in the dangerous activity of pioneering and one which, hopefully,
will add knowledge about safely launching future manned (peopled) missions.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
~ Dust in the wind...All we are is dust in the wind......... ~
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Jay Wooten Los Alamos National Lab ARPA:jkw@lanl.ARPA