New amateur footage of Challenger disaster surfaces

[TheSeeker]

I just came across this video and thought it was kind of interesting. It was shot about 70 miles away from the launch site by a guy trying out his new betamax camcorder.

http://nycaviation.com/2010/01/31/p...r-video-of-space-shuttle-challenger-disaster/

It's kind of eerie how they slowly come to realize what has just happened.

 

[Yeoman Randi]

Sadly i remember the Challenger disaster like it happened yesterday. I had the television on and i brought my then 2 year old son in to watch the takeoff with me. I remember well how it took me (and everyone else) so long to realize what we had seen. Just heartbreaking. It was really something for that man to turn the tape over before he passed on.

Thanks for sharing that heartbreaking link with us.

 

[thestrangequark]

^Like your son, I was two years old, and watching the launch with my parents. I had a little toy space shuttle to ride in, and was sitting on it. I remember my mother crying. It is one of my earliest memories.

 

[Zulu Romeo]

I was six when I saw it happen. It was the very first time I had experienced the feelings of denial and disbelief. It took me a long time before it could all sink in.

Thanks for sharing that link. It's still chilling to watch.

 

[Lindley]

I have no memory of the event itself. I suppose I was 3 at the time, but I've always just thought of it as yet another historical event.

 

[Franklin]

First, the snarky stuff. "Heh, heh. Betamax. Heh, heh." OK, that's out of the way --

I was in graduate school, in my apartment with the flu. I awoke from a nap and turned on the TV. Still just half awake, there was Dan Rather, talking in a somber voice about the Challenger and its crew. It took me about two minutes to piece togther that he was talking about it having just blown up. Then they showed the footage.
I had to share it with someone, so I called my graduate student office number and told them to get in front of a TV, or turn on NPR, or something, because the Challenger had just exploded shortly after launch. I got dressed and went in, after that. I didn't feel like being alone. It turns out my call is how the entire department heard about the disaster.

 

[Locutus of Bored]

I watched it in sixth grade. The teacher wheeled in the TV for us to watch it, and a lot of the kid's started crying.

Why did this guy keep the video to himself all these years? He acknowledged in the video itself that he had recorded a piece of history. Maybe they would have wanted a copy for the accident investigation and for museums and the media afterward. Not that it would likely provide any further insights, but still, he should have shared it.

 

[Yeoman Randi]

I would have to think that Nasa has a ton of cameras from all angles set up to watch the take-off. This guy's video from how many miles away certainly couldn't tell them anything they wouldn't have gotten off of their own cameras. Don't you think?

 

[SeerSGB]

I would have to think that Nasa has a ton of cameras from all angles set up to watch the take-off. This guy's video from how many miles away certainly couldn't tell them anything they wouldn't have gotten off of their own cameras. Don't you think?

See something from that distance that they didn't catch on closer cams? Something like this is never hurts to have more information than you need; better to have and not need it, than need it and not have it.

 

[Franklin]

I would have to think that Nasa has a ton of cameras from all angles set up to watch the take-off. This guy's video from how many miles away certainly couldn't tell them anything they wouldn't have gotten off of their own cameras. Don't you think?

Yeah. This is hardly like the Zapruder film. He probably sat on it for so long because he realized that himself. It wasn't going to help any investigation to release it.

 

[auntiehill]

I was in high school at the time. They pulled us out of class and took us to the library, and there on the TV, Dan Rather was holding a model of the Space Shuttle. The teachers turned off the TV as soon as we came in and told us what had happened. We went back to class and I sat there, a bit stunned.

It was a very sad, strange day.

 

[Squiggy]

I would have to think that Nasa has a ton of cameras from all angles set up to watch the take-off. This guy's video from how many miles away certainly couldn't tell them anything they wouldn't have gotten off of their own cameras. Don't you think?

No new information will come from this. It's just a new vantage

 

[Locutus of Bored]

I would have to think that Nasa has a ton of cameras from all angles set up to watch the take-off. This guy's video from how many miles away certainly couldn't tell them anything they wouldn't have gotten off of their own cameras. Don't you think?

Yes, that's why I said that in my post:

Why did this guy keep the video to himself all these years? He acknowledged in the video itself that he had recorded a piece of history. Maybe they would have wanted a copy for the accident investigation and for museums and the media afterward. Not that it would likely provide any further insights, but still, he should have shared it.

 

[RJDiogenes]

"That's trouble of some kind."

I was 24 years old, sitting in my office at St. Margaret's when somebody poked her head in the door and said the Space Shuttle exploded. The image that popped into my head was an explosion on the pad. The only access to news I had was the radio in the mail room down the hall; I didn't see any video until I got home. It was heartbreaking. I didn't sleep for several days.

I wonder if he withheld the video because he didn't want any notoriety; maybe he just didn't want to be asked about it or interviewed and so waited until he knew he would be gone.

 

[USS Triumphant]

I watched it in sixth grade. The teacher wheeled in the TV for us to watch it, and a lot of the kid's started crying.

This is how I experienced it, too, except I was in 5th grade, and by the end of that same school day, I had already heard the "What does NASA stand for? Need Another Seven Astronauts" thing. I was so sad and PISSED.

 

[Spot's Meow]

Sad stuff. I was born on the day of the Challenger explosion. It's hard for me to imagine it affecting people so much because we seem to care so little about the space program now, at least the people around me. I don't pay attention to any of the launches that go on.

 

[RobertVA]

I had read some material about the shuttles and watched several earlier launches on TV. As I watched the launch on TV I initially thought that was a odd looking booster separation. Then I noticed there was much more exhaust from the boosters than there normally is at separation. That's when I realized the external tank had disintegrated. For a short period after that realization I was hoping to see the orbiter glide out of the cloud of steam (from the external tank propellants), but of course all I saw was falling debris. I still wonder if one of the larger pieces I saw that day was the crew compartment.

I was in a computer club meeting when Challenger broke up and someone from the business school we were meeting at told us after the meeting ended (just a few minutes after it was reported on the news).

 

[AJBryant]

I was working nights, then, so slept during the day and missed the launch. When I woke up and came out of my cave, one of my housemates said, "The shuttle blew up." I thought he was kidding. "Ha ha. Yeah, right." Then I turned on the TV.

Blew my mind.

 

[Mark de Vries]

God, that's so sad. I can never watch any footage of the disaster without chills down my back.

 

[Yeoman Randi]

I would have to think that Nasa has a ton of cameras from all angles set up to watch the take-off. This guy's video from how many miles away certainly couldn't tell them anything they wouldn't have gotten off of their own cameras. Don't you think?

Yes, that's why I said that in my post:

Why did this guy keep the video to himself all these years? He acknowledged in the video itself that he had recorded a piece of history. Maybe they would have wanted a copy for the accident investigation and for museums and the media afterward. Not that it would likely provide any further insights, but still, he should have shared it.

I did see that you had said that. But I still think there was no point in him sharing it. And to be frank, for all we know, once he gave it to them they filed it away in that gigantic room in a box that no one ever looks in.