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Issues Index | Next => Space Shuttle Mission 51-L lifted off from Pad B at Cape Canaveral at 11:38 am Eastern on this day in 1986, twenty years ago today. It was the 25th Shuttle launch, the 10th for Challenger (OV-099). Challenger had made 987 orbits of the earth and spent 69 days in space in her first nine flights. On board were Francis R. Scobee, Michael J. Smith, Judith A. Resnik, Ellison S. Onizuka, Ronald E. McNair, Gregory B. Jarvis, and Sharon Christa McAuliffe. The mission ended in a fireball 46,000 feet above the Atlantic, 73 seconds into the flight. I stood in shock and cried when I heard it on the radio, there's quite a lump in my throat as I prepare this message. Christa McAuliffe, the schoolteacher who trained and joined the mission as Payload Specialist 2, had as her motto, "Reach for the Stars." So should we all.
Throw your dreams into space like a kite, and you do not know what it will bring back, a new life, a new friend, a new love, or a new country. I cannot join the space program and restart my life as an astronaut, but this opportunity to connect my abilities as an educator with my interests in history and space is a unique opportunity to fulfill my early fantasies. We must accept life for what it actually is - a challenge to our quality without which we should never know of what stuff we are made, or grow to our full stature. Adventure isn't hanging on a rope off the side of a mountain. Adventure is an attitude that we must apply to the day-to-day obstacles of life: facing new challenges, seizing new opportunities, testing our resources against the unknown and, in the process, discovering our own unique potential. If we die, we want people to accept it. We're in a risky business, and we hope that if anything happens to us it will not delay the program. The conquest of space is worth the risk of life. Accept the challenges so that you may feel the exhiliration of victory. Would you like to see quotes like these in your mail tomorrow morning? Our 10,000 loyal subscribers hate to miss a day, perhaps you should sign up now! No cost or obligation, just be open to the enlightenment waiting for you among our 22,500+ quotes.
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