Where were you when the first shuttle went up?

[delaney]

I feel so sad about seeing the last flight of the Discovery going overhead today to its resting place in Dulles. I remember being in 8th grade science class watching on TV. The science teacher was absolutely giddy.:tongue_smilie:

[Parrothead]

I suppose I was in school (would have been 9th grade). There was no hoopla made about the flight.

[athena1277]

I don't remember the first shuttle launch, but I remember the Challenger explosion when I was in 3rd grade.

[trafal]

Jr High in Charlotte, NC. The classroom watched the live coverage on TV with Dan Rather. It seems like a long time ago:001_smile:

[Princess Peach]

I was just shy of 7 years old, and I don't remember anything about it. I do remember the Challenger explosion, though.

[Stayseeliz]

I grew up on the Space Coast in Florida. This is all so sad for me! It's really the economy down there too.

[jelbe5]

I was in jr. high, home from school, sick, watching the test landings of the shuttle after it left the jet it was piggy-backed on . . .

[ssavings]

What year was that?

[curlylocks]

I don't remember the first shuttle launch, but I remember the Challenger explosion when I was in 3rd grade.

 

I don't remember the first launch either...but I remember the Challenger explosion. I was in 10th grade History class taught by Mr. Davis.

[Butter]

I had to Google when it was. April 12, 1981. I had just turned 3. I would assume I was home with my mom. Whether we watched it on TV or not, who knows. I have no memory of it whatsoever of course.

[ssavings]

Oh... I wasn't born. I don't remember the challenger explosion, either, but I have read about it and seen pictures.

[delaney]

Ok it must have been have been 6th grade for me then. I also remember the explosion but I don't know where I was.....

[akmommy]

I dont remember for sure as I was pretty young at the time. I do remember however being in 7th grade when Columbia blew up during its launch. We were in the library at school watching the launch live.

[gardenmom5]

I was in high school - and those who were interested in watching it were able to skip class and go to a science (or was it math?) room and watch it.

 

eta: i was a young married with two kids when the challenger blew up. My mom called to tell me what happened. I was sitting there folding wash while watching it over and over on the news.

Edited April 17, 2012 by gardenmom5

[Kertie]

Oh... I wasn't born. I don't remember the challenger explosion, either, but I have read about it and seen pictures.

 

I was feeling young until I read this. :lol:

 

I don't remember it, although I would've been 6. I do remember the Challenger--I was in 5th grade and two of the teachers at my school had applied to go, so it was a big, big deal.

 

I have mixed feelings about the current state of things regarding space exploration.

[nono]

Junior in high school for the Columbia launch.

 

Senior in college for the Challenger disaster.

 

 

 

P.S. I'm ignoring ssavings post.:tongue_smilie:

[amo_mea_filiis.]

Not yet born.

[Kathleen in VA]

Working my first job after graduating from college (USDA) in 1981.

 

Teaching first grade when the Challenger exploded. I'm very glad I decided not to bring the TV into class that day. The school secretary told me when I went down to the office to get something. It was hard to remain upbeat when I returned to my class.

 

Yeah, I'm old.:)

[Occasionally]

Standing on the driveway outside of our house near Orlando, watching :)

 

Wasn't it on a Sunday?

[cjzimmer1]

I don't remember the first launch but I remember Challenger. I was sick that day and staying at my grandma's house for the day. Normally I wouldn't mind being home sick because my mom let us watch TV all day. However, it was less fun to go to grandma's when we were sick because she only got 3 stations. I remember the day very clearly because the ONLY thing on any station was news coverage about the explosion. I really didn't care about it at all and was quite upset that instead of next to nothing to watch on TV now there truly was nothing to watch on the TV. One of the few days I actually wished I was well enough to go to school because at least then I would have had something to do all day.

 

Funny how your perspective changes when you get older. If it happened today, I would have been switching internet sites as much as possible trying to get as much information as I could.

[swellmomma]

I had to Google when it was. April 12, 1981. I had just turned 3. I would assume I was home with my mom. Whether we watched it on TV or not, who knows. I have no memory of it whatsoever of course.

 

1981 I would have been 3.5 at the time of the first launch. Don't remember it, but I do remember the challenger explosion

[HappyCrazyMama]

I was ten but I have no recollection of knowing anything about it.

[lynn]

Funny you should bring this up. Just today we came across pictures of the Atlantis launch from November 1990 that dh took. He got to see several of the shuttles launch up close. I remember standing in my back yard in FL watching a trail of smoke as the first shuttle went up.

[ereks mom]

I don't remember the first shuttle launch. :(

[LinRTX]

I'm old too. I had already been on my first job out of college for a year when the first space shuttle launched. Someone had brought in a TV and we all crowded around to watch. When the Challenger exploded, I had just had my first child -- he was less than two weeks old and would not sleep. I don't remember if my husband saw it first and called me or if I saw it and called him. Those weeks are such a blur to me because of lack of sleep.

 

Linda

[myfatherslily]

I had to Google when it was. April 12, 1981. I had just turned 3. I would assume I was home with my mom. Whether we watched it on TV or not, who knows. I have no memory of it whatsoever of course.

 

On that date, I was inside my mother, waiting to be born one month later. :001_smile:

[BridgeTea]

Where was I? Living as a young mommy in West Texas. We didn't own a television at the time, but I would have read about the first launch in the newspaper. There's a good chance I was busy making my son's 1st birthday cake the day of the launch, also.

 

What I do remember is about a year or so before that, some NASA employees came to the local school one evening to show anyone interested a sample of the heat shield tiles and a model of the shuttle. They put a torch to the tiles until they were glowing orange on one side, yet were safe to touch with our bare hands on the other side. This demonstration was at the tiny little school that my MIL worked at, and was at her invitation (she was the lone science teacher). I was fascinated by the identification numbers on the individual tiles - no two tiles the exact shape or size, IIRC. Only about a dozen of us bothered to show up for the demonstration.

 

Challenger disaster is a clearer memory. My son came home from kindergarten and started telling me a fantastic tale of an exploding rocket "all over the sky". It took me a while to catch on that it was a launch day with a real disaster, not just a little boy's wild tale. He had watched it in school, and mommy and daddy had to catch up later on the news. My MIL had applied, so the what-ifs shook her a bit.

[DusksAngel]

I had to Google when it was. April 12, 1981. I had just turned 3. I would assume I was home with my mom. Whether we watched it on TV or not, who knows. I have no memory of it whatsoever of course.

 

I was 3, almost 4 at the time so I would have been in daycare at the time. I don't remember it at all. I do remember Challenger though.

[nono]

What I do remember is about a year or so before that, some NASA employees came to the local school one evening to show anyone interested a sample of the heat shield tiles and a model of the shuttle. They put a torch to the tiles until they were glowing orange on one side, yet were safe to touch with our bare hands on the other side. This demonstration was at the tiny little school that my MIL worked at, and was at her invitation (she was the lone science teacher). I was fascinated by the identification numbers on the individual tiles - no two tiles the exact shape or size, IIRC. Only about a dozen of us bothered to show up for the demonstration.

 

THANK YOU for posting this. I was a bit:confused: picturing me doing this in earlier high school (I got to hold the tile). I didn't recall it was before the first launch.

[NicAnn]

Not born yet. My generation and the generations after are really missing out on the whole NASA thing. ;)

[BridgeTea]

THANK YOU for posting this. I was a bit:confused: picturing me doing this in earlier high school (I got to hold the tile). I didn't recall it was before the first launch.

 

I was pregnant with my first, so hmm...maybe late winter/early spring 1980 is when NASA came to visit our area?

 

Very cool you got to hold the tile! They seemed small for the job they had to do.

 

Gosh, NASA space programs hold lots of memories for me. First moonwalk? Our whole neighborhood was in our living room, because we had the "only color TV set on the block". Haha! We were all shocked when it came on in black and white!

[LostSurprise]

According to the date I was in 3rd grade, but I don't remember it specifically.

 

I had a 1st or 2nd grade teacher who was big on that stuff and we had lots of pictures (Saturn? Jupiter? it was one of the Voyager missions) from one of the probes they had back then. The pictures were really beautiful. She told us about the shuttle program being started. It seemed safer then the pod I saw in I Dream of Jeannie though. I wondered why they hadn't thought of putting a big plane in space before!

 

My 4th grade teacher caught us all up on the space shuttle program, and they had tvs up for one of the early Challenger launches in 5th grade.

 

The Challenger explosion was when I was in 7th grade. I was late and I heard someone talking about it as I went to class. They announced it later in the day.

[Kathleen in VA]

Not born yet. My generation and the generations after are really missing out on the whole NASA thing. ;)

 

Wow, I never thought of that. There will be so many more, too, who will not get the whole NASA space exploration thing as a part of their lives. I was between 5th and 6th grade when Neil Armstrong walked on the moon and watched it on TV with my family. I feel like someone who has crossed the prairie in a covered wagon.:001_huh:

[AHASRADA]

In 3rd grade. I only remember it because it was such a big deal that they rolled the TV cart into our room for the event. All I really remember was the TV cart; nothing of the shuttle :glare:.

 

I clearly remember the shuttle explosion. 7th grade, snow day so mom and I were in the mall. Everyone was gathered around the TVs at Radio Shack. My social studies teacher had applied to be the teacher on board, but obviously wasn't chosen. Sad day.

[PinkInTheBlue]

I was 9 but I don't recall hearing much about it or none at all. I convinced my mother to let me stay home from school the day of the Challenger explosion. I convinced her to let me keep my approximately 5 year old brother home with me too, just because. :) For whatever reason I was actually watching the launch on television and remember trying to explain to my little brother what had happened. I guess I had a tendency to "school" even then. :) I was about 13 or so.

[Mommy22alyns]

I was not quite 3. But I do vividly remember the Challenger explosion.

[AdventureMoms]

I was 2 months old. I don't remember the Challenger explosion either. And my kids don't recognize a landline telephone. :-D

[GailV]

Senior in college, with so much on my mind about my own little life and pending graduation that I really was fairly unaware of the shuttle launch.

 

The Challenger disaster, though, was a different story. I was working for a company that had supplied parts (not o-rings, though). We were all at work tracking the launch with excitement due to our involvement, and all of a sudden we were compiling documentation about our parts because Powers That Be knew a big investigation was likely. Plus we were in New Hampshire, so Christa McAuliffe was one of "ours". I think we were all on autopilot, walking around in a daze.

[DawnM]

I was living overseas with no television. I am sure it was in the papers but I was at boarding school and we didn't get the paper.

 

I do remember the Challenger. I was in college.

[Oak Knoll Mom]

I was nine when the first shuttle went up. I went to a small private school and several families near the school opened up their homes for us to watch the shuttle. I ended up at my aunt's house with the other elementary school students.

[Colleen in NS]

I was 13, but I don't remember where I was. I only vaguely remember watching the news about the first shuttle going up. But I do remember thinking it was neat.

 

...

The Challenger disaster, though, was a different story. I was working for a company that had supplied parts (not o-rings, though). We were all at work tracking the launch with excitement due to our involvement, and all of a sudden we were compiling documentation about our parts because Powers That Be knew a big investigation was likely. Plus we were in New Hampshire, so Christa McAuliffe was one of "ours". I think we were all on autopilot, walking around in a daze.

 

But, I, too, remember the Challenger disaster clearly. I was in 12th grade in Maine, and a good friend of mine was very excited about the Challenger launch that day. He had moved from NH the previous summer, and had had Christa McAuliffe for a teacher recently - he was so excited for her. When our school heard about the explosion, I ran out of the cafeteria to go find my friend - down the hall he came with a dazed expression on his face.

 

Funny someone should mention missing so much of the initial space exploration years. I am reading two books right now - one by Jim Lovell about Apollo 13, and one by Gene Kranz about his years as Flight Director. They are fascinating books!! I knew these guys were courageous explorers, but it never really registered until I started reading details about early testing, flights, rescues, disasters, near-disasters, math, physics, the details about flying to the moon and back, plopping into the ocean in a metal tank, etc.. Completely fascinating stuff from the 1950s til now.

[SweetIrony]

That was about 4 years before I was born. My parents were not even married yet!

[Whereneverever]

That was about 4 years before I was born. My parents were not even married yet!

 

Ha, I thought I was the only one!