Artemis take-off delayed ! .. .. Challenger disaster in 1986

Chandamama, Moon has enamoured mankind from time immemorial.  Scientists have been working hard on reaching to space, moon for  scientific discovery, economic benefits, and inspiration for a new generation of explorers – the rage now is ‘Artemis’.  

With the whole World following its launch, Artemis 1 ran into trouble as team engineers noticed that one of the engines had an issue with the liquid hydrogen. The launch director had signed off on a plan to troubleshoot one of the RS-25 engines which was malfunctioning. But the troubleshooting plan did not work. The countdown clock was put on hold at T-40 minutes as the hydrogen team discussed options with the launch director.  

Artemis I is an uncrewed mission that will be the first in a series of increasingly complex missions to the Moon, eventually taking humans back to Earth’s lone satellite. During the mission, NASA will demonstrate the performance and capabilities of its most powerful launch vehicle ever, the Space Launch System (SLS), and the Orion crew capsule. During the approximately six-week-long mission, SLS and Orion will travel a distance of around 65,000 kilometres to the Moon and back. With Artemis missions, NASA will land the first woman and first person of colour on the Moon, using innovative technologies to explore more of the lunar surface than ever before. The aim is to have a long term presence on the moon and then the next giant leap -  sending the first astronauts to Mars.  NASA’s Artemis 1 launch has now  been postponed due to a malfunctioning RS-25 engine on the Space Launch System (SLS) rocket. The  US space agency has not confirmed the next date for the launch, though there are two more launch windows. One is in four days on September 2, and the second is a few weeks down.

US has landed people on moon .. .. the  Space Shuttle program was the fourth human spaceflight program carried out by the U.S. National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA), which accomplished routine transportation for Earth-to-orbit crew and cargo from 1981 to 2011. Its official name, Space Transportation System (STS), was taken from a 1969 plan for a system of reusable spacecraft of which it was the only item funded for development.  It flew 135 missions and carried 355 astronauts from 16 countries, many on multiple trips. The Space Shuttle—composed of an orbiter launched with two reusable solid rocket boosters and a disposable external fuel tank; when its mission was complete, the orbiter would reenter the Earth's atmosphere and land like a glider at either the Kennedy Space Center or Edwards Air Force Base. The Shuttle is the only winged crewed spacecraft to have achieved orbit and landing, and the first reusable crewed space vehicle that made multiple flights into orbit.  

STS-51-L was the 25th mission of the NASA Space Shuttle program, the program to carry out routine transportation for Earth-to-orbit crew and cargo; as well as the final flight of Space Shuttle Challenger. Planned as the first Teacher in Space Project in addition to observing Halley's Comet for six days, the mission never achieved orbit; a structural failure during its ascent phase 73 seconds after launch from Kennedy Space Center Launch Complex 39B on January 28, 1986, killed all seven crew members —Commander Francis R. "Dick" Scobee, Pilot Michael J. Smith, Mission Specialists Ellison S. Onizuka, Judith A. Resnik and Ronald E. McNair, and Payload Specialists Gregory B. Jarvis and S. Christa McAuliffe—and destroyed the orbiter.

Judith Arlene Resnik (1949 - 1986) was an American electrical engineer, software engineer, biomedical engineer, pilot and NASA astronaut who died in the Space Shuttle Challenger disaster. Resnik was the fourth woman, the second American woman and the first Jewish woman of any nationality to fly in space, logging 145 hours in orbit. Recognized while still a child for her intellectual brilliance, Resnik was accepted at Carnegie Mellon University, after being one of only sixteen women in the history of the United States to have attained a perfect score on the SAT exam at the time. She went on to graduate with a degree in electrical engineering from Carnegie Mellon before attaining a PhD in electrical engineering from the University of Maryland.

At age 28, Resnik was selected by NASA as a mission specialist. She was part of NASA Astronaut Group 8, the first group to include women. While training on the astronaut program, she developed software and operating procedures for NASA missions. Her first space flight was the STS-41-D mission in August and September 1984, the twelfth Space Shuttle flight, and the maiden voyage of Discovery, where her duties included operating its robotic arm. Her second Shuttle mission was STS-51-L in January 1986 aboard Challenger. She died when it broke up, shortly after liftoff, and crashed into the ocean.

The Space Shuttle Challenger disaster was a fatal accident on January 28, 1986, in the United States space program where the Space Shuttle Challenger (OV-099) broke apart 73 seconds into its flight, killing all seven crew members aboard. It was the first fatal accident involving an American spacecraft in flight. The crew compartment and many other fragments from the shuttle were recovered from the ocean floor after a three-month search-and-recovery operation.  The disaster resulted in a 32-month hiatus in the Space Shuttle program. President Ronald Reagan created the Rogers Commission to investigate the accident. The commission criticized NASA's organizational culture and decision-making processes that had contributed to the accident.  

With regards – S. Sampathkumar

30^th Aug 2022.