Challenger Disaster Jan 28, 1986 anniversary

Jan 28,1986  “structural failure of the external tank caused Aerodynamic forces to break up the launched orbiter. Background:  On January 28, 1986, the NASA shuttle orbiter mission STS-51-L and the tenth flight of Space Shuttle Challenger (OV-99) broke apart 73 seconds into its flight, killing all seven crew members, which consisted of five NASA astronauts and two payload specialists. The spacecraft disintegrated over the Atlantic Ocean, off the coast of Cape Canaveral, Florida, at 11:39 a.m. EST (16:39 UTC). The disintegration of the vehicle began after a joint in its right solid rocket booster (SRB) failed at liftoff. The failure was caused by the failure of O-ring seals. Contextual FACT: Everything in the known universe is made of systems and structures -- that operate on ‘fundamental principles’.   And, when fundamental principles (the Laws of Nature and Nature’s God) aren’t followed, catastrophic consequences are inevitable. Relevance of event?  Survival of our species.   We can blame the “O Rings’ or the failure of the engineers who overlooked fundamental mathematical principles (Laws of Nature) in determining the potential failure rate of at least one of multiple O Rings required to function flawlessly.  But we would be missing other flawed principles used in other human systems and structures that contributed to this spectacular disaster.   It would prove even more useful however, to explore the flawed human principles in even larger systems and structures (mostly of government, economics, and business) that will prevent us from achieving a space program that is increasingly vital to our national security -- and in the longer run -- finding another planet where we can sustain the miracle of life before earth’s life support systems are trashed by us or some inevitable cosmic event. One of the Astronauts killed in the Challenger disaster was Christa McAuliffe, a History, Social Studies, English and Civics teacher who was selected out of 11,000 applications of ‘ordinary people’ to be the first civilian in space.  An initiated started by President Ronald Raegan intended to educate Americans about the value of space exploration.  Once in orbit she was planning to conduct two 15-minute classes, one a tour of the spacecraft, called "The Ultimate Field Trip", and the other about the benefits of space travel, called "Where We've Been, Where We're Going, Why." Our nation has launched Americans into space at least 55 times over 25 years and and their safe return came to be taken for granted.  The Challenger explosion obliterated our nation's complacent attitude toward such launches.  Today’s private investments in space travel are booming and the Chinese landing on the far side of the moon is a new Sputnik moment waking us up to the national security implications of an effective space program. What we need to be woken up to is the profoundly devastating consequences in continuing to govern our beautiful planet using human systems and structures that persistently ignore fundamental principles (laws of nature and nature’s God) and instead fund flawed human principles like “Peace through Strength” or “peace through disarmament”.   The weaponization of space (and every other element of technology) will not end well for us.  There is a reason every prominent religion has as its foundation ‘the Golden Rule”.    Science, engineering, education, politics and economics must now devote every system and structure to funding the 17 Sustainable Development Goals to foster life on earth (Heaven on earth or on Earth as it is in Heaven.  We have a very thin and fragile covering over earth that we need to survive.  Someone once called it our ‘biofilm’.  We need to look at it as our Space Ship earth’s O ring.  Business and government as usual, just isn’t going to resolve our O ring problem.    Human principles will never effectively replace the Laws of Nature and Nature’s God.  Enough lives have been lost experimenting with our own invented principles and laws.  It would appear wise to change this before Artificial Intelligence gains consciousness and the wisdom to make that change for us.

"From out there on the moon, international politics look so petty. You want to grab a politician by the scruff of the neck and drag him a quarter of a million miles out and say, "Look at that, you son of a bitch." -  Edgar Mitchell, Apollo 14 astronaut