It was an important day for the United States. For months the media reported on this important space shuttle mission. The news had been on the front page for months and all that expectation had spread throughout the Western world, where newspapers, radio and television reported on the launch.

An atmosphere of celebration and joy reigned among all the friends, curious people and family who attended in the surroundings of Cape Canaveral. As in the first launches and landings of the shuttles, pride, patriotism and the feeling of conquering space were present in the American population.

The main novelty of this mission, was that for the first time a civilian, a woman teacher of a school, was selected among thousands of aspirants from all over the country, was part of the crew.

The fact that an ordinary citizen, not an astronaut, traveled with real astronauts into space, opened a focus of hope for everyone that soon anyone could embark on such an incredible adventure. Moreover, the fact that he was an American citizen made an entire nation proud, in the midst of the Reagan era and the Cold War.

The excitement, the laughter, the pride, the joy, only lasted about 76 seconds...

In the blink of an eye, disbelief, awe, horror, sadness, and tears took hold of everyone present, and an entire nation that was following the television launch.

The greatest tragedy in the history of trips to outer space had occurred, transmitted live and in real time to the whole world.

Filmmakers Daniel Junge and Steven Leckart directed this four-episode documentary, where NASA engineers, the staff working at the time and the families of the crew of the last Challenger flight, offer a revealing testimony about the before and after of the tragedy. The two filmmakers in charge of the documentary have experience directing other documentaries, including one about September 11 and another about the world of comics.

Through these types of documentaries, which review history, we can understand many things that at the time, ordinary people did not know or were not aware of. Let's remember that it was the eighties, when for us, the Internet was science fiction.

The shuttle missions were a milestone in American aerospace history. For the first time, a manned spacecraft could be launched from the ground and then return and land as an airplane. Space travel, as seen in movies and television series, was increasingly possible to become a reality. The first launches were an exciting event for the population.

The documentary tells us how NASA used this as a propaganda mechanism to exalt patriotic pride. That is why the missions took up a lot of space in the media and always had a novelty, for example: the first African-American in the shuttle mission. Then the news was the first female astronaut on a shuttle mission. On another mission, she was the first Asian-American. But everything was coming to an end, to the point that the shuttle missions to outer space were losing inches in the press and media, people had become bored.

The Reagan administration made a populist move to put the importance of NASA back into the spotlight. It was a time when Hollywood had orders to create stories that showed American power, the Rambo saga was an example of this. The President himself ordered NASA to select an exemplary American citizen for the next special mission, telling them proudly that she should be a teacher.

It was all a publicity stunt to get people excited about the shuttle missions again. And it was a success, they achieved the goal.

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All space missions, since the Americans arrived on the Moon, were high-risk missions. The danger was always present. But until that moment, NASA had managed to get the astronauts to land safely. No one had died on any of the missions.

The use of solid fuel in the shuttles increased the risk; it was a bomb that any failure could cause a tragedy. The engineers working on the testing and construction of the propellants had warned of the great danger of something going wrong. NASA was aware of all the risks - absolutely!

NASA's airtightness before the tragedy created a great crisis, a commission was appointed that after a long time of work and investigations determined that the accident was caused by a failure in the sealing of the correct rocket, something they knew could happen, due to the failed tests since 77.

For the young people who did not experience the Challenger tragedy, this is an excellent documentary, with only four episodes, where the details of the tragedy are well explained and the statements of the victims' families are emotional. If you don't like documentaries very much and prefer fiction, there are two productions about this tragedy that you can see. One is the film for television, produced by the British, called The Challenger, is from 2013 and one of its protagonists is William Hurt.

The other film for television, called The Challenger Disaster, written and directed by Nathan VonMinden, was released in 2019 and has an extensive cast, of which I will only name Dean Cain, Glenn Morshower, Eric Hanson, Les Miles and Erika Waldorf.

If those two fiction films and the documentary are not enough for you, because you are addicted to information and research, like me, you can also read this full article from wikipedia link

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