Today’s movie is a disaster drama with a scene that happened
on January 28. Watch it tonight and enjoy.
CHALLENGER
The Challenger crew, Dick Scobee, Christa McAullife, Ron McNair, Elison Onizuka, Mike Smith, Greg Jarvis and
Judith Resnick rehearse their in-flight broadcast. We then flashback to when
Christa McAullife was selected as a teacher in space winner. Dick Scobee
practices shuttle landings. Morton Thiokol engineers say they can’t do accurate
tests with the booster rockets in a horizontal position. Ron McNair teaches
karate. MT engineer Roger Boisjoly knows the O-rings could fail during a
launch. Scobee meets Christa. NASA has a meeting about O-ring erosion at
launch. Christa meets the rest of the crew. The commander and pilot work the
simulator and practice post launch abort scenarios. Concerns are raised again
about the O-rings. Julie Reznick and Christa McAullife become friends.
Onizuka’s is wife is angry with him for always coming home late, leading to
tension, while Mike Smith and wife have a very close relationship. Corporate
politics at MT hamper the search for a solution to the O-ring problem. Ron
McNair shows his son around the shuttle simulator and Scobee flies Christa on
g-force acclimation flights. Christa misses her family and Greg Jarvis is added
to the flight. The crew practice underwater and Christa upsets the NASA liaison
by always being late for meetings. The crew has a press conference. Morton
Thiokol says they have no data about O-ring performance at low temps and say
the shuttle shouldn’t launch when there are extremely low temperatures on
launch day. NASA is upset at this as they think this recommendation is based on
no data. MT bows to NASA pressure and says launch. There is a hard freeze at the launch site. The crew boards Challenger on
January 28, 1986 and the engines fire. [2:02:09 to 2:18:26]
A sentimentalized biopic of the crew. Doesn’t really get
into their characters. Does show the bureaucracy that contributed to the
disaster.
Air and Space Disasters of the World by Xavier
Waterkeyn (New Holland Publishers, London, 2007) at pages 228 – 229 gives the
date of the launch
Awards – The film won the Outstanding Sound Editing Emmy. It
was also nominated for the Outstanding Sound Mixing Emmy at the 42nd
Primetime Emmy Awards.
Producers - George Englund, Jr., Courtney Pledger and Debbie
Robbins
Director - Ben Jordan
Screenplay – George Englund
Released - February 25, 1990
Runtime - 2 hours 40 minutes
Starring -
Karen Allen as Christa McAuliffe
Kristin Bond as Caroline McAuliffe
Kale Browne as Steven. McAuliffe
Peter Boyle as Roger Boisjoly
Barry Bostwick as Dick Scobee
Brian Kerwin as Michael J. Smith
Joe Morton as Dr. Ronald McNair
Keone Young as Lt. Col. Ellison Onizuka
Richard Jenkins as Gregory B. Jarvis
Julie Fulton as Dr. Judith Resnik
Angela Bassett as Cheryl McNair
Copyright by Ivan Walters in 2015
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