A large section of the destroyed space shuttle Challenger has been found buried in sand at the bottom of the Atlantic
Jan. 28, 1986: Space shuttle Challenger disaster
Just 73 seconds into liftoff, the NASA space shuttle exploded, killing all seven crew members.
CAPE CANAVERAL, Fla. -- A large section of the destroyed space shuttle Challenger has been found buried in sand at the bottom of the Atlantic, more than three decades after the tragedy that killed a schoolteacher and six others.
NASA’s Kennedy Space Center announced the discovery Thursday.
“Of course, the emotions come back, right?” said Michael Ciannilli, a NASA manager who confirmed the remnant's authenticity. When he saw the underwater video footage, “My heart skipped a beat, I must say, and it brought me right back to 1986 ... and what we all went through as a nation."
It's one of the biggest pieces of Challenger found in the decades since the acciden t, according to Ciannilli, and the first remnant to be discovered since two fragments from the left wing washed ashore in 1996.
Divers for a TV documentary first spotted the piece in March while looking for wreckage of a World War II plane. NASA verified through video a few months ago that the piece was part of the shuttle that broke apart shortly after liftoff on Jan. 28, 1986. All seven on board were killed, including the first schoolteacher bound for space, Christa McAuliffe.
The underwater video provided “pretty clear and convincing evidence,” said Ciannilli.
The piece is more than 15 feet by 15 feet (4.5 meters by 4.5 meters); it's likely bigger because part of it is covered with sand. Because there are square thermal tiles on the piece, it’s believed to be from the shuttle’s belly, Ciannilli said.
The fragment remains on the ocean floor just off the Florida coast near Cape Canaveral as NASA determines the next step. It remains the property of the U.S. government. The families of all seven Challenger crew members have been notified.
“We want to make sure whatever we do, we do the right thing for the legacy of the crew,” Ciannilli said.
Roughly 118 tons (107 metric tons) of Challenger debris have been recovered since the accident. That represents about 47% of the entire vehicle, including parts of the two solid-fuel boosters and external fuel tank.
Most of the recovered wreckage remains buried in abandoned missile silos at Cape Canaveral Space Force Station. The exception is a left side shuttle panel on display at Kennedy Space Center's visitor complex, alongside the charred cockpit window frame from shuttle Columbia, which broke apart over Texas during reentry in 2003, killing seven astronauts.
Far less has been recovered of Columbia — 42 tons (38 metric tons) representing 38% of the shuttle. The Columbia remains are stored in converted offices inside Kennedy’s massive hangar.
Launched on an exceptionally cold morning, Challenger was brought down by eroded O-ring seals in the right booster. Columbia ended up with a slashed left wing, the result of foam insulation breaking off the external fuel tank at liftoff. Mismanagement was also blamed..
A History Channel documentary detailing the latest Challenger discovery airs Nov. 22.
Quelle: abcNews
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Taucher finden Trümmer von Challenger-Raumfähre
Ein Zufallsfund von Tauchern sorgt für Aufregung in den USA: Auf dem Meeresgrund vor der Ostküste Floridas stießen sie auf ein großes Wrackteil des Challenger-Spaceshuttles. Die Echtheit der Teile wurde bereits durch die NASA bestätigt. Das Spaceshuttle war im Jänner 1986 kurz nach dem Start explodiert, wobei die Besatzung ums Leben kam - es handelt sich um den bis dahin schwersten Unfall in der Raumfahrtgeschichte der USA.
Ein Objekt, das bei einem Tauchgang gefilmt wurde, habe die NASA als Teil der Challenger identifiziert, teilte die US-Raumfahrtbehörde am Donnerstag (Ortszeit) mit. Demnach waren Taucher, die eigentlich für eine TV-Dokumentation nach dem Wrack eines Flugzeugs aus dem Zweiten Weltkrieg suchten, auf einen großen, teils sandbedeckten Gegenstand gestoßen.
Eigentlich hatten die Taucher nach dem Wrack eines Flugzeugs aus dem Zweiten Weltkrieg gesucht.
(Bild: AFP/The History Channel/Lucie Aubourg)
Kurz nach Start explodiert Die Nähe zum Raumfahrtzentrum an Floridas Ostküste sowie die modern wirkende Konstruktion des Artefakts brachte das Filmteam dazu, die NASA über seine Entdeckung zu informieren. Das Challenger-Unglück gehört zu den großen Tragödien der internationalen Raumfahrt.
Nach mehreren erfolgreichen Flügen war die Challenger am 28. Jänner 1986 kurz nach ihrem Start vom Kennedy Space Center explodiert und auseinandergebrochen. Die siebenköpfige Besatzung - zwei Astronautinnen und fünf Astronauten - kam ums Leben.
Der US-Sender History Channel wird über die Entdeckung nach eigenen Angaben in einer Serie über das Bermudadreieck berichten. Ungeachtet dessen, erklärte die NASA, sei das Wrackteil in den Gewässern der sogenannten Space Coast von Florida gefunden worden - also deutlich nordwestlich des Seegebiets im Atlantik, das für das mysteriöse Verschwinden von Schiffen bekannt ist.
Quelle: Kronen Zeitung
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History Channel team finds large piece of space shuttle Challenger
One the largest pieces of NASA's fallen space shuttle Challenger has been discovered on the ocean floor by a TV documentary team searching for a downed World War II aircraft.
The artifact, which today remains where it was found by the crew filming The History Channel's new series "The Bermuda Triangle: Into Cursed Waters," was positively identified by NASA based upon the item's modern construction and presence of 8-inch square thermal protection (heat shield) tiles. The segment of Challenger was found in waters off Florida's Space Coast, well northwest of the area popularly known as the Bermuda Triangle.
"This discovery gives us an opportunity to pause once again, to uplift the legacies of the seven pioneers we lost and to reflect on how this tragedy changed us," said NASA Administrator Bill Nelson in a statement issued on Thursday (Nov. 10). "While it has been nearly 37 years since seven daring and brave explorers lost their lives aboard Challenger, this tragedy will forever be seared in the collective memory of our country. For millions around the globe, myself included, Jan. 28, 1986, still feels like yesterday."
The search for Challenger
The space shuttle Challenger broke apart 73 seconds into its 10th launch after seals in one of the vehicle's two solid rocket boosters failed. NASA's STS-51L crew, including commander Francis "Dick" Scobee, pilot Mike Smith, mission specialists Ron McNair, Ellison Onizuka and Judy Resnik, payload specialist Greg Jarvis and Teacher-in-Space Christa McAuliffe were killed in the aftermath of the malfunction.
A major search and salvage effort was organized in the wake of the tragedy, the largest ever conducted by the U.S. Navy and U.S. Coast Guard at that time. The operation involved thousands of people, 16 surface vessels, a nuclear-powered research submarine and several robotic and crewed submersibles systematically inspecting more than 486 square nautical miles (1,666 sq km) of ocean floor in depths ranging from 10 to over 1,200 feet (3 to 365 m).
After seven months, 167 pieces of the shuttle, weighing 118 tons, were recovered. The debris represented 47 percent of the orbiter Challenger, 33 percent of the external tank, 50 percent of the two solid rocket boosters and between 40 and 95 percent of the mission's three primary payloads (an inertial upper stage, a tracking and data relay satellite and an astronomical tool to observe Halley's Comet).
After being analyzed to learn what caused the failure, the wreckage was placed into two silos — Complex 31 and 32 at the Cape Canaveral Air Force Station (now Space Force Station) — each 78 feet deep by 12 feet in diameter (24 by 4 m), which had previously supported Minuteman missiles up until 1970. The silos were not considered burial sites or a memorial for Challenger, but rather a storage site, and in the years since, as additional pieces have washed up on shore, they have been added to the archive.
In 2015, for the first and only time to date, NASA placed a large section of space shuttle Challenger's fuselage on public display as part of "Forever Remembered," a permanent memorial to the nation's fallen shuttle crews at the Kennedy Space Center Visitor Complex in Florida.
Unexpected find
The History Channel's find is the first major discovery of wreckage from the STS-51L disaster in more than 25 years.
"In reviewing the footage that the team provided, we can see a section roughly 15 by 15 feet [4.5 by 4.5 meters]. However, we did note that the item does extend deeper into the sand so the true size is hard to determine at this point, but I am rather confident that it is one of the largest pieces ever found of Challenger," Mike Cianelli, program manager of NASA's Apollo, Challenger and Columbia Lessons Learned Program, said in a video statement released by NASA.
The History Channel film crew did not set out to find a piece of Challenger. Rather, in March 2022, the team embarked on a series of scout dives to investigate several suspected wreck targets off the coast of Florida, with one of those targets being outside of the Bermuda Triangle, offshore from Cape Canaveral. The divers were initially looking for the wreck of a PBM Martin Mariner rescue plane that disappeared without a trace on Dec. 5, 1945, while searching for five U.S. Navy torpedo bombers on a mission code named Flight 19 that had also disappeared earlier that day.
Instead of World War II-era plane debris, the team discovered a modern-looking aviation structure. After consulting with an outside expert and completing a second dive in May 2022, the TV film crew presented the evidence to former NASA astronaut Bruce Melnick, who suspected it was a piece of the Challenger. Based on that information, the series' producers brought the find to the attention of NASA and in August 2022, Ciannilli, confirmed it was a significant remnant of the fallen shuttle.
"The significance of this large section of Challenger's structure was readily apparent," underwater explorer Mike Barnette, who led the History Channel team that made the discovery, said in a statement released by A+E Networks. "We recognized the necessity of bringing this find to the immediate attention of NASA. The site, which is outside of the Bermuda Triangle off the Florida coast, marks the loss of seven brave astronauts — fellow explorers."
"One of the very first things that we did is we notified all the families of the space shuttle Challenger so they are aware of this," said Ciannilli.
Keeping the memory alive
The first episode of The History Channel's six-part series "The Bermuda Triangle: Into Cursed Waters," scheduled to premiere on Nov. 22, chronicles the Challenger find, from first dive to the teams' meeting at NASA.
"While the remarkable discovery of wreckage from Challenger was not part of our diving team's initial mission exploring the Bermuda Triangle, the find's historical significance cannot be understated," said Eli Lehrer, executive vice president and head of programming for The History Channel. "The Challenger is a vital part of our nation's history and we are honored to bring this important finding to light."
"Currently at this time we're reviewing options of how to move forward after this discovery. But I can assure you NASA will put the memory and legacy of the crew in the families foremost in its thoughts and planning as we move forward," said Ciannilli. "It's very important to keep the memory of the crew and the mission alive."
