July 16, 2025 • 43 mins
The Congressional Space Medal of Honor is awarded to those who go above and beyond– at the farthest edges of our frontier. Judy Resnick was one of our country’s first women astronauts, but what makes her a hero is something else: her willingness to face death in the name of serving a greater good.
Special thanks to the NASA History Office, Performance Initiative Podcast, and the Ronald Reagan Presidential Library.
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Episode bibliography:
Higginbotham, Adam. “Challenger: A True Story of Heroism and Disaster on the Edge of Space.” Avid Reader Press / Simon & Schuster, May 14, 2024. https://www.amazon.com/Challenger-Story-Heroism-Disaster-Space/dp/198217661X.
Mullane, Mike. “Riding Rockets: The Outrageous Tales of a Space Shuttle Astronaut.” Scribner, February 6, 2007. https://www.amazon.com/Riding-Rockets-Outrageous-Shuttle-Astronaut/dp/0743276833.
SWE Magazine. “Judith Resnik’s Living Legacy” All Together, January 26, 2021. https://alltogether.swe.org/2021/01/judith-resniks-living-legacy/.
Galloway, Barbara. “Astronaut and Akron native Judith Resnik remembered as brilliant, strong-willed.” Beacon Journal, January 27, 2020. https://www.beaconjournal.com/story/news/local/2020/01/27/jan-29-1986-judith-resnik/1820447007/.
National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA). Report of the Presidential Commission on the Space Shuttle Challenger Accident: Chapter II - Events Leading Up to the Challenger Mission. https://www.nasa.gov/history/rogersrep/v1ch2.htm.
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Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:01):
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The link is also in our show notes below. Pushkin.
It was Tuesday, June twenty sixth, nineteen eighty four, on
(00:50):
a launchpad in Cape Canaveral, Florida. The Space Shuttle Discovery
was preparing to take its first voyage into orbit. There
were six astronauts on board, harnessed into their seats, lying
on their backs, facing up towards the Cosmos. The hatch
to the crew compartment closed. The astronauts felt a pop
(01:14):
in their ears as the cabin pressurized, and then they waited, nervous,
their chit chat and jokes fading into silence. Soon the
only sound was the woosh of the cabin fan. At
t minus two minutes, the astronauts closed the visors on
(01:37):
their helmets. Good luck everybody, their mission commander said, this
is it. Do it like we've trained eyes on the instruments.
At T minus thirty one seconds, Discoveries computers assumed control.
Speaker 2 (01:54):
Of the countdown, so they have a quince start.
Speaker 1 (01:59):
The astronaut hearts were racing. They focused their whole beings
on what was about to happen, on everything they had
trained for years to do.
Speaker 2 (02:12):
We have a main engine start.
Speaker 1 (02:15):
At T minus ten seconds, six high pressure turbo pumps
began to work, sending thousands of pounds of propellant to
the shuttle's three main engines. At T minus six seconds,
the cockpit started to shake and rattle violently. The first
(02:36):
engine headlet. This was it. Liftoff was about to begin,
and then suddenly the vibrations stopped. The cockpit was as
silent and eerie as a tomb. The crew knew instantly
(02:56):
that something was very, very wrong. They were only seconds
away from lighting the solid rocket boosters, two giant canisters
of fuel that would propel the shuttle into orbit. If
they ignited now while the shuttle was still on the
launch pad, they would generate more than six million pounds
(03:19):
of thrust. It would rip the shuttle apart. Everyone on
board would be dead instantly. The astronauts weren't sure exactly
what was happening, but they knew they were sitting on
a bomb that might be about to go off. I'm JR. Martinez,
(03:46):
and this is Metal of Honor Stories of Courage. In
this episode, you'll meet the recipient of a different kind
of metal, the Congressional Space Medal of Honor. It was
authorized by Congress in nineteen sixty nine and since then
has only been awarded to thirty astronauts. It is given
(04:08):
to those men and women who distinguish themselves through quote
exceptionally meritorious efforts and contributions to the welfare of the
nation and mankind. And just like the Medal of Honor,
it has to be approved by the President of the
United States. The Space Medal of Honor doesn't award heroism
(04:30):
in battle. It rewards the heroism you need if you're
going to push to the farthest edges of our frontier.
That heroism tells us every bit as much about the
nature of courage and sacrifice as the classic Medal of
Honor does. This story is about Judith Resnik, one of
(04:53):
the astronauts aboard the Space Shuttle Discovery on that summer
morning in nineteen eighty four. Judy was a brilliant engineer
who joined NASA along with five other women in the
late seventies and went through years of grueling training to
qualify to be on that shuttle. She was the second
(05:14):
American woman in space after Sally Ryde, and she understood
deep in her bones how risky her assignment was, but
she did it anyway. She persisted through that danger, not
because she wanted to be a woman in space as
some kind of token or ceiling breaker. She did it
(05:38):
because she had a job to do, a job she
was doing for her country, for all of us. She
would do that job until the morning she died at
the age of thirty six, free falling through the clear
blue winter sky. By the time Judy Resnik decided to
(06:14):
become an astronaut, she had been the only woman in
the room literally dozens of times. That's what you got
from being a female math, genius an engineer in the
late nineteen sixties and seventies. She was born in Akron, Ohio,
in nineteen forty nine. Her parents were first generation Jewish Americans.
(06:35):
Judy was exceptional from the start. She trained to be
a concert pianist, and she was amazing at it. She
spoke French. She was the only girl in the math
club in high school. She graduated first in her class,
and she was accepted early to the famous Juilliard School
of Music. But then Judy scored an eight hundred on
(06:59):
the math Porsche of her college SATs, the only female
high school student in the country that year to achieve
a perfect score. So she switched gears and enrolled at
Carnegie Mellon University to study electrical engineering. There were barely
any other women in the department, but she was getting
(07:19):
used to that. Judy graduated first in her class and
promptly started adding to her expertise designing radar control and
rocketree circuits at RCA, working in biomedical engineering at the
National Institutes of Health, getting her PhD in electrical engineering
with honors. But while success came easily, finding something to
(07:45):
spark her interest was harder. That all changed in nineteen
seventy seven, when NASA finally opened its applications to women.
Judy was twenty seven. NASA's decision was a long time coming.
Speaker 3 (08:04):
It was American men who first walked in space and
then set the first human footprints on a planet other
than Earth, and subsequent flights have remained a sort of
free floating bachelor party.
Speaker 1 (08:18):
This is from a documentary made in nineteen eighty three.
I can't tell if it's meant to be funny or what.
Speaker 3 (08:27):
From nineteen sixty until nineteen seventy seven, for reasons that
will forever remain unclear, NASA was unable to find a
single qualified woman candidate.
Speaker 1 (08:38):
Or as one woman put it, they trained a Tim
pan Z to go to space before they trained a
single female astronaut. Anyways, in the late nineteen seventies, NASA
had developed this space Shuttle. Unlike the old spacecraft, it
would be reusable, able to take trips a year, which
(09:01):
meant NASA would need more astronauts, and so finally women
were allowed in the door. Judy wasn't really that interested
in space until she happened to see the NASA recruitment
noticed on some bulletin board. This is Judy.
Speaker 4 (09:19):
I decided to apply to be an astronaut when I
was a graduate student finishing up my research work. It
was not something that I had planned to do for
my whole life. It was a case of being in
the right place at the right time. NASA was advertising
for astronauts at the time that I was looking for
a job.
Speaker 1 (09:37):
If she made it sound easy, it wasn't. More than
eight thousand people applied to become astronauts that year. Of those,
a little over a thousand were women. Judy worked hard
to stand out from the crowd, reaching out to astronaut
John Glenn an Apollo eleven pilot Michael and to learn
(10:00):
more about the space program. She got a pilot's license,
and while she waited to hear from NASA, she moved
to California and took a job with Xerox. Soon enough,
she was one of two hundred finalists invited to the
Johnson Space Center in Houston. Of those two hundred, only
twenty one were women. Judy submitted to a week of
(10:24):
interviews to physical test and mental ones. NASA recruiters needed
to know if these potential astronauts would respond badly to stress.
In January of nineteen seventy eight, Judy got the news
she would be one of six women accepted into the program.
(10:47):
At the press conference, she stepped onto the stage and
smoothed her skirt. She had straightened her dark, curly hair
and wore a nervous smile on her face.
Speaker 5 (11:01):
Mission Specialist. Her residence is Redondo Beach, California. Her present
position is engineering staff product development with the Xerox Corporation.
El Segunde.
Speaker 1 (11:15):
Judy moved to Houston with the rest of the thirty
five newly minted astronauts. She would train as a mission specialist.
Speaker 6 (11:23):
The mission specialist does things associated with the experiments on
board or deploying the satellites, while the pilots do most
of the flying of the orbiter.
Speaker 1 (11:34):
While she might not be flying the shuttle, the training
was still brutal and it would last for years. More
than any other of the six women, Judy was determined
to be seen as one of the boys. As she
once told her father quote that I don't want to
be a Jewish astronaut. I don't want to be a
(11:57):
Jewish woman astronaut. US want to be an astronaut period.
I just wanted to go in space and do my job.
A few years into her training, Tom Broker asked her
what it was like to break into that old boys club.
Speaker 7 (12:18):
Once you got into the program, wasn't there a little
bit of resentment or a little bit of male chauvinism
that was demonstrated to that's.
Speaker 1 (12:23):
A very male kind of fighter pilot world as you
were in Rick.
Speaker 2 (12:27):
Not at all.
Speaker 8 (12:27):
As a matter of fact, I think everybody leaned over
backwards to make sure that we were treated as equal
right from the beginning.
Speaker 1 (12:35):
This, of course, was not entirely true. Mike mullane was
also a mission specialist in Judy's class of astronauts, and
he remembers the men oggling her, teasing her with dirty jokes.
It sounds like training with a bunch of teenagers. One
time the guys put a live grass snake in her back.
(12:56):
They waited in the other room to hear her open
her purse, and which she did. I would have but
they respected her brilliance and reliability. Mulane has served as
an Air Force colonel before he joined NASA. He was
pretty tough. He had flown one hundred and thirty four
combat missions in Vietnam, and he remembers Judy this way quote.
(13:21):
I'd watched her fly formation from the backseat of T
thirty eight's and lead instrument approaches in bad weather and
do it as well as me. I'd washed a repel
off the side of the orbiter mock up in our
emergency training, parascel into the water in our survival training,
worked twenty feet underwater in a three hundred pounds spacesuit
(13:44):
in simulation. After simulation, she had instantly and correctly reacted
to countless emergencies. The other astronauts felt that they could
trust Judy with their lives. Plus, she was a really
good time. Here's Rhea Seddon, who is one of the
first female astronauts.
Speaker 9 (14:06):
She was really really bright, obviously very beautiful person, flirtatious, funny.
You know, if she was just a live wire, you know,
we would do the Happy Hours or we'd go on
these NASA trips, and Judy was just a star attraction.
She was just having a great time and was obviously
friends with everybody.
Speaker 1 (14:26):
NASA kept sending her out to do press, which Judy hated.
Journalists would ask her personal questions, questions they would never
ask a male astronaut like this Jim from tom Brookaw.
Speaker 5 (14:41):
Are there discussions on Houston about what happens.
Speaker 7 (14:43):
When men and women go into space for the first
time together? After all, if you're up there.
Speaker 5 (14:48):
In some kind of a prolonged space mission.
Speaker 7 (14:50):
And there may be even relationships that will develop between
men and women.
Speaker 8 (14:53):
Well, I think from our point of view, since we're
so used to working together professionally, that we look at
each other as profession colleagues on the ground, in orbit
and whatever, and we view it that way. Period.
Speaker 7 (15:05):
You think the time will come when there will be
a romance in the outer space, then oh gee, I
really couldn't tell.
Speaker 1 (15:09):
You that, Tom, what are you doing? Understandably, Judy started
to avoid the press. She sometimes would hide from reporters,
using her fellow astronauts as human shields. And then at
the start of nineteen eighty two, it became clear that
(15:30):
NASA was going to assign a woman to a shuttle crew.
Whoever it was would become the first American woman in space.
The female astronauts were more than ready. Judy had a
bright pink bumper sticker made that read a Woman's place
(15:51):
is in the cockpit. It looked like it was going
to come down to either her or Sally Ride. Ride
was a brilliant physicist and PhD who had married a
fellow astronaut. Sally was comfortable with the press, calm and
well spoken on TV. And then there was Judy, equally
(16:13):
brilliant but single, who cursed like a sailor, went out
dancing in nightclubs, and rolled her eyes whenever her gender
became part of the conversation. The decision, unfortunately, was probably
pretty clear. In April of nineteen eighty two, NASA announced
(16:34):
that Sally Ride would be the first American woman astronaut
in space. It would be two long years before Judy
would have her first brush with space. That day, when
Discovery's engines shut down on the launchpad and Judy realized
she might be about to die. In nineteen eighty four,
(17:14):
Judy Resnek was finally scheduled for emission to space. It
would be Discovery's maiden voyage, although, as Judy joked with
the other five astronauts, who were all men, quote, there
are no maidens on this voyage. Judy, as an expert engineer,
specialized in the operation of the mechanical arm, which was
(17:37):
controlled from within the cockpit but located outside the orbiter.
It was used to lift solar panels and position satellites.
Here's Judy describing what the team would be doing with
the arm during a TV interview.
Speaker 4 (17:52):
The remote Manipulator Arm will be used to take large satellites,
for example, out of the cargo bay and put them
into orb but the orbiter will act much like a bus,
and the satellite will be getting off at it's bus stop,
so to speak. We get to the right place in
the right time, and we'll pick it up with the arm,
and we'll put it where we want to let go,
and then back the orbiter away and leave it there.
Speaker 1 (18:15):
Operating the arm took incredible skill. Here's Tom Brokaw again
talking about Judy on a news broadcast.
Speaker 7 (18:23):
Despite her protestations that she couldn't do things better than
some of the men, all and men told me that
when she operated that big arm at the back of
the payload, she had a great touch, that she had
real dexterity.
Speaker 1 (18:35):
Discovery was set to launch in June. A few days
before lift off, Judy and a friend discussed who would
inherit her things if the mission went wrong and she
didn't return. Her friend asked if she was ready for
the risk, and Judy replied, quote, oh yeah, I know
what's involved, but it was about to become very real
(18:58):
for her. The astronauts boarded the Shuttle in the early
morning of June twenty fifth, but there was a problem
with the backup flight system computer. The liftoff was scrubbed
and rescheduled for the following day, that was June twenty sixth.
Same drew an early morning wake up entry through the hatch,
(19:22):
the astronaut's ears popping as the cabin was depressurized. Judy's father, brother,
and mother were watching from the Lodge Control Center, located
three miles from the launch site, at a safe distance
from any potential explosion. Then came countdown fifteen. The propellant
(19:43):
flowed to the solid rocket boosters, that pair of giant
rockets connected to either side of the orbiter, which provided
eighty five percent of the Space Shuttle's thrust at liftoff,
and for the first two minutes of a cent we
have main engines start and then the terrifying silence. Everyone
(20:09):
on board the shuttle was worried that the solid rocket
boosters would ignite when they were still on the ground,
tearing the shuttle apart. And then they heard crackling over
the intercom. There's a small fire on the launchpad. Here's
Mike Mullane, who was on that flight with Judy.
Speaker 10 (20:31):
And I'll never forget thinking there's no such thing as
a small fire when you're sitting on four million pounds
of repellent. That was a real terror. Hear the word fire.
That's the scaredest I think I've probably ever been in
my life, sitting out there wondering what the heck's going
on with that fire on the launch pad.
Speaker 1 (20:48):
In the grandstands, spectators had seen a bright flash as
the engines ignited. Some were convinced that they had seen
an explosion. Judy's mother bent her head and rested it
in her hands. It looked like she was praying. Water
began to spray against the shuttle windows. The crew unstrapped
(21:12):
from their seats and debated opening the hatch to make
an emergency escape. They didn't know that the fire outside
the shuttle was hydrogen, and hydrogen fires are invisible. They
might have unknowingly exited the hatch directly into the flames.
Fortunately they decided to wait. It was more than forty
(21:37):
minutes before the astronauts finally got out, but they survived.
At the press conference afterwards, they did what they had
been trained to do. They lied, and they said that
they hadn't been afraid at all. Judy said, quote, I
was disappointed, but I was relieved that the safety systems
(21:57):
do work. It was unfortunate that we had to check
them out, but it built confidence in the whole system.
In truth, the astronauts hadn't just been terrified of the
rockets blowing them apart or of the fire. Lift off
itself was dangerous, and the Shuttle wasn't designed with any
(22:18):
way for the crew to escape once it was airborne.
Here's Mike Mulane talking about the Shuttle on a Performance
Initiative podcast. He makes it so clear why the Shuttle
launch was terrifying for everyone on board. We didn't have
any way of bailing out of a shuttle. Of course,
you're not gonna be able to bail out.
Speaker 11 (22:38):
Of it in space or anything, but in the atmosphere,
if you had an escape system, you know, some type
of injection seats or pots or something, you might be
able to survive. But Shuttle didn't have any of that.
So fear is very very high on Shuttle launch.
Speaker 1 (22:53):
No way to escape, just let that sink in. Maybe
had intellectually known the risk of what she was doing,
but now I'm sure she really felt it. And yet
on August thirtieth, nineteen eighty four, when NASA made its
(23:13):
fourth attempt to launch Discovery. She was there and this
time lift off went exactly as planned.
Speaker 2 (23:24):
Three two when wed that's our reignition, and we had
lifted off, lifted off, and n D the first flight
and labor in the Discovery and the tuttle had cleared
the power.
Speaker 1 (23:37):
Judy Resnik became the second American woman in space. She
released satellites into orbit and conducted experiments on a giant
folding solar panel.
Speaker 4 (23:49):
This is the largest structure ever deployed in space. All
in all, it was a good flight test for large
space structures with potential future use in either space based
construction or in space station operations.
Speaker 1 (24:01):
Zero gravity turned Judy's curly hair into a cloud. She
had on gold rimmed aviator sunglasses and those short shorts
everyone wore in the eighties. She looked well glamorous. Back
on Earth, people weren't happy about that, but Judy was
just being herself as usual. While Discovery was circling our
(24:26):
planet at five miles per second, the crew filmed themselves,
eating and sleeping, even running on a treadmill.
Speaker 4 (24:35):
Exercise was part of our daily routine on orbit, just
like it is back here on Earth. Getting set up
on the treadmill takes a little bit longer on orbit,
but it feels just as good to quit.
Speaker 1 (24:47):
But there was one episode that did it make the
highlight real. The crew had been sent up with an
Imax camera. While it was filming, the camera caught a
lock of Judy's hair and so into the mechanics. Judy
was upset, but not because the other astronauts had to
cut off a chunk of her hair to set her free.
Speaker 10 (25:09):
Let me tell you, the press had the women under
a microscope and were looking for the slightest indication that
a woman was different than a man, and as a result,
the women were paranoid about displaying anything anything that would
remotely be construed as, Oh, you're different than a man.
Speaker 1 (25:32):
Mike Mulane remembers that when Judy's hair jammed up the camera,
the commander, Hank Hartsfield said he would call down to
mission control and tell them they were going to have
problems filming for the day.
Speaker 10 (25:45):
And Judy looked at him and I don't remember her
exact words, but basically it was, you know, I'm going
to cut your heart out if you so much as
say a word over the air. About my hair getting
caught in this thing. To us it was baffling, like
why it's the big deal, But it quickly bec came
apparent to us. What her concern was is that if
that was blabbed to the whole world, it would be
(26:06):
the thing. It wouldn't matter how well Judy did on
the mission, all the things she did, she would be
remembered as the woman who had her hair that jeopardized
the imaxian that you know, women are different than me
and their hair as long, you know that type of thing,
that's what the press would pick up on.
Speaker 1 (26:20):
She knew it. They fixed the camera and after six
days they returned home. Judy was thrilled. Surely now she
would be seen as an astronaut, not a woman astronaut.
But very soon the whole world would know her name
(26:41):
for a different reason. In nineteen eighty one, Judy got
(27:01):
the news that she had been hoping for. She was
scheduled for a second mission to space. It wasn't just
because she had shown again and again how brilliant and
professional she was. It was also because, to boosts public excitement,
NASA had decided to invite a civilian to join the mission.
(27:22):
Her name was Krista mccauliffe, a teacher from New Hampshire,
and they wanted a seasoned female astronaut to be on
the flight with her. They would be on the Space
Shuttle called Challenger. Judy, like most of the astronauts in
the Shuttle program, was initially skeptical about sending a civilian
(27:44):
into orbit, but she soon realized how alone and overwhelmed
mccaulloff felt, so she set up a series of coffee
dates and taught mccauliff about celestial mechanics and how the
combustion of the Shuttle's engines worked. She told her quote,
it's not as hard as they make it sound. Judy
(28:06):
was the only astronaut picked for the Challenger mission who
had experienced that brush with death on Discovery, and yet
she had total confidence in the Shuttle and in the program.
Here's a clip of her from an interview around that time.
Are you a bit scared?
Speaker 9 (28:23):
No, I'm not scared.
Speaker 10 (28:26):
Why not?
Speaker 4 (28:28):
We trained so heavily for all the contingencies, and we're
so familiar with the procedures that we can almost do
them in our sleep.
Speaker 1 (28:36):
But there were things that NASA and the engineers at
Morton Diacol, the company that made the solid rocket boosters,
didn't tell the astronauts think of the rockets kind of
like a giant stack of metal cans filled with highly
explosive propellant. Morton Diacol had designed thirteen foot ubber gaskets
(29:00):
called O rings to seal the joints of those cans
and keep the gas inside from leaking. If the O
rings did it work, hot gas would escape through the
casing of the rocket, causing an explosion, burning through everything
and everyone inside the shuttle. After Judy's first flight on Discovery,
(29:26):
the engineers who inspected the rockets were alarmed to see
that the O rings had traces of such between them.
That meant that for a few moments at least, the
O rings had failed to seal, and as Shuttle missions
kept flying, it was clear that the issue with the
rocket booster joints was getting worse. There was one particular
(29:50):
cause for concern, cold weather, which could make the O
rings more brittle. A brittle O ring would be too
inflexible to create that all important seal that kept the
gas from leaking out. But of course, the shuttle launched
from southern Florida freezing temperatures weren't supposed to be part
(30:13):
of the deal at all. The engineers and Morton thiacol
knew that in order to really address the issue, they
would have to take the shuttles offline, but this felt impossible.
For one thing, there was pressure within NASA to prove
that the Shuttle really could operate almost like an airplane
(30:36):
flying regular missions into space. The launch scheduled was already
played with delays and cost overruns. Add to that the
public excitement over the Teacher in Space program, which put
even more pressure on NASA to get the Shuttle aloft. Judy,
(30:57):
like all the astronauts, knew that ASSO would do whatever
it took to make Challenger launch on time. She even
joked with Tom Brokaw about it.
Speaker 7 (31:09):
I had an enthusiastic letter from her saying that she
was hoping I could come down and watch this one
because she was sure was going to go off on schedule.
We used to have a running dialogue about whether NASA
could keep to a schedule or not.
Speaker 1 (31:20):
But Judy was wrong. Liftoff was initially scheduled for January
twenty second, nineteen eighty six. That was postponed again, and
then again Finally, on January twenty seventh, it looked like
Challenger would launch. The crew made it inside the shuttle,
(31:44):
strapped in, and then they were delayed by an issue
with the handle on the hatch. By the time it
was fixed, the winds had kicked up and the launch
was scrubbed for the day, which brings us to Tuesday,
January twenty eighth. The Challenger was scheduled to launch at
nine thirty eight am, but the forecast looked bad a
(32:07):
record breaking cold snap by the night before. It was
clear to the engineers at Morton Thiocoll that the shuttles
should not fly. They presented their concerns to their bosses
and to NASA management. But NASA didn't want another delay,
not just because of the growing embarrassment, but because it
(32:32):
would put the rest of the year's mission schedule off track,
and the executives at Morton thiocol were just about to
enter into negotiations to keep their lucrative contract with NASA.
The engineers insisted it wasn't safe. The two sides argued
deep into the night, and then the engineers gave in.
(32:56):
The launch would go ahead as planned. None of the
astronauts or the millions of people who would be tuning
in to watch the first teacher go to space knew
anything about any of it. A few hours before liftoff,
the temperatures bottomed out at twenty degrees fahrenheit. Technicians use
(33:21):
brooms to remove icicles, some of them two feet long,
from the shuttle and the launch pad. At the crew quarters,
the astronauts woke up before dawn. They walked through press
and cheering fans to the van that would take them
to the launch pad. Judy was smiling in her blue jumpsuit,
her hair blowing in the cold breeze, and hand out
(33:44):
wave into someone in.
Speaker 12 (33:45):
The crowd in the difference to fight through now and
then they're so un followed by a Specialisty rests Ron
McNair pilot Mike Smith, followed by christ follow feature in
face Aunt Ellison on Azuka and Palos specialists Greg Jarvist
Big smiles today, considently getting into the van.
Speaker 1 (34:12):
Once they reached challenger, Judy took her seat at the
flight engineer's position behind the commanders and pilot's seats. Before
she got strapped in, she turned to mcculluff and said, quote,
the next time I see you we'll be in space.
At the grand stand, the crowd shivered in the icy air.
(34:33):
Judy's father was there, so were the families of all
the astronauts. Krista mcculluff's husband and kids, plus all of
her son's third grade classmates were there, cameras locked in
on their hopeful faces. The launch was delayed one hour,
(34:54):
then another, and another as they waited for the ice
on the shuttle to melt inside the crew cabin. The
astronauts were convinced that it would be canceled. Judy said, quote,
I hope we don't have to drive this down to
the better end again. But then at eleven twenty nine am,
(35:17):
the countdown began.
Speaker 3 (35:20):
See minus fifteen seconds.
Speaker 1 (35:22):
The engines were ready to fire. The instrument panel and
the cockpit showed the final seconds of the countdown. The
crew was.
Speaker 3 (35:31):
Ready eight seven six, we have main engines start.
Speaker 1 (35:37):
Millions of kids in classrooms across the country tuned in.
So did the engineers and Morton Thiokol, sitting in a
conference room sharing the same sick feeling holding hands.
Speaker 13 (35:54):
And lift on lift off of the twenty fifth Face
Shuttle mission, and as.
Speaker 2 (36:00):
The tower.
Speaker 1 (36:02):
As the shuttle launched sheets of ice more than three
feet wide fell off part of the launch pad. Even now,
the O rings were failing. Hot gas at more than
five thousand degrees fahrenheit leaked out of the side of
a solid rocket booster. A joint ruptured. The astronauts wouldn't
(36:26):
have known any of this, not yet. The shuttle shook
and rattled as it went higher into the atmosphere. It
was hard for the astronauts to read their instruments. As
they approached the speed of sound, Judy shouted in excitement
shit hot. At fifty eight seconds into the flight, a
(36:50):
bright orange flame flared at the bottom of the right booster,
and then it grew. It crept around the fuel tank,
acting like a blow torch, cutting in to the tank
and igniting it. But the instruments in the cockpit and
at Michigan Control still didn't show that anything was wrong.
Speaker 2 (37:11):
Downder go and thrown up.
Speaker 1 (37:15):
At seventy two seconds, the fuel tank burst apart into
a giant fireball. You can probably picture it right, the
huge white cloud, and then two streamers of smoke curling
away from one another, out and down a big y
(37:38):
in the clear blue sky. To the people in the
grandstand and watch it on TV. It wasn't clear what
they were seeing. Was this the thing that always happened?
Their cheers faltered, then faded for a moment. Michigan Control
(37:59):
was silent, and then my controllers.
Speaker 9 (38:03):
Here looking very carefully at the situation.
Speaker 4 (38:07):
Obviously a major malfunction.
Speaker 1 (38:10):
But inside Michigan Control they knew how bad it was.
There was no more data from the flight communication with
the astronauts. The down link was gone.
Speaker 2 (38:25):
We have no down link, Business Mission Control, Houston. We
have no additional word. At this time, the.
Speaker 1 (38:37):
Crew compartment had shot out of the blaze of rocket fuel,
Tumbling slowly. It was in a free fall towards the
Atlantic Ocean. It took two minutes and forty five seconds
for it to hit the water. It is believed that
the seven members of the crew were alive the whole
(38:57):
way down. Their oxygen would have been disconnected when the
shuttle blew apart. It's likely that they were suffocating in
their seats. After all, there was no escape system, no
ejection seats, no pods, nothing to do but watch out
(39:22):
the shuttles windows. As the unforgivenly hard surface of the
ocean got closer and closer. When we talk about heroism,
particularly on this podcast, it's often in terms of saving
(39:46):
lives of remarkable one man stands against terrible odds. But
I think we can also agree that there is this
kind of heroism that has less to do with safe
others and more to do with putting yourself at risk
in the name of a greater good. The astronauts of
(40:09):
the Shuttle program and the ones who came before and after,
were serious scientists, determined to learn more about the cosmos.
They were explorers at the outer edge of what we
know about our world. They weren't going to space for fun.
They were going there to work for us. Judy Resnik
(40:36):
was as clear eyed and analytical as they come. She
knew exactly what kind of risks she was taking, but
she felt the rewards outweighed the peril. They all did.
Ronald Reagan put it this way at the Challenger Memorial Service.
Speaker 13 (40:55):
This America was built on heroism and noble sacrifice. It
was built by men and women like our seven Star Voyagers,
who answered a call beyond duty, who gave more than
was expected or required, and who gave it little thought
of worldly reward.
Speaker 1 (41:18):
They named a public elementary school after Judy in her hometown,
and every year the students sing a song in her honor.
Call me a softie, but it really hits me in
the hearts. I think that's heroism in a nutshell, knowing
(42:07):
the risk and pushing ahead anyways because you're serving something
greater than yourself. Full throttle up, all systems Go. Medal
of Honor Stories of Courage is written by Meredith Rollins
and produced by Meredith Rollins and Jess Shane. Our editor
(42:30):
is Ben Nadafh Hoffrey. Sound design and additional music by
Jake Gorsky. Our executive producer is Constanza gayartro fact checking
by Arthur Gomberts, original music by Eric Phillips. Production support
by Suzanne gabber Special thanks to the NASA History Office
Performance Initiative Podcast and the Ronald Reagan Presidential Library. And
(42:56):
don't forget. We want to hear from you. Send us
your personal story of courage or highlight someone else's bravery.
Just email us at Medal of Honor at Pushkin dot fm.
You might hear your stories on future episodes of Metal
of Honor, or see them on our social channels at
Pushkin Pods. I'm your host JR. Martinez
Hey everyone, We've put together a survey for listeners of
Medal of Honor and we want to hear from you.
Tell us what you love about the show, what we
can improve on, or stories you think we've missed. We're
committed to making this show even better and you can
help to take the survey. Visit bit dot lee slash
MH survey. That's bit dot l y slash MH survey.
(00:27):
The link is also in our show notes below. Pushkin.
It was Tuesday, June twenty sixth, nineteen eighty four, on
(00:50):
a launchpad in Cape Canaveral, Florida. The Space Shuttle Discovery
was preparing to take its first voyage into orbit. There
were six astronauts on board, harnessed into their seats, lying
on their backs, facing up towards the Cosmos. The hatch
to the crew compartment closed. The astronauts felt a pop
(01:14):
in their ears as the cabin pressurized, and then they waited, nervous,
their chit chat and jokes fading into silence. Soon the
only sound was the woosh of the cabin fan. At
t minus two minutes, the astronauts closed the visors on
(01:37):
their helmets. Good luck everybody, their mission commander said, this
is it. Do it like we've trained eyes on the instruments.
At T minus thirty one seconds, Discoveries computers assumed control.
Speaker 2 (01:54):
Of the countdown, so they have a quince start.
Speaker 1 (01:59):
The astronaut hearts were racing. They focused their whole beings
on what was about to happen, on everything they had
trained for years to do.
Speaker 2 (02:12):
We have a main engine start.
Speaker 1 (02:15):
At T minus ten seconds, six high pressure turbo pumps
began to work, sending thousands of pounds of propellant to
the shuttle's three main engines. At T minus six seconds,
the cockpit started to shake and rattle violently. The first
(02:36):
engine headlet. This was it. Liftoff was about to begin,
and then suddenly the vibrations stopped. The cockpit was as
silent and eerie as a tomb. The crew knew instantly
(02:56):
that something was very, very wrong. They were only seconds
away from lighting the solid rocket boosters, two giant canisters
of fuel that would propel the shuttle into orbit. If
they ignited now while the shuttle was still on the
launch pad, they would generate more than six million pounds
(03:19):
of thrust. It would rip the shuttle apart. Everyone on
board would be dead instantly. The astronauts weren't sure exactly
what was happening, but they knew they were sitting on
a bomb that might be about to go off. I'm JR. Martinez,
(03:46):
and this is Metal of Honor Stories of Courage. In
this episode, you'll meet the recipient of a different kind
of metal, the Congressional Space Medal of Honor. It was
authorized by Congress in nineteen sixty nine and since then
has only been awarded to thirty astronauts. It is given
(04:08):
to those men and women who distinguish themselves through quote
exceptionally meritorious efforts and contributions to the welfare of the
nation and mankind. And just like the Medal of Honor,
it has to be approved by the President of the
United States. The Space Medal of Honor doesn't award heroism
(04:30):
in battle. It rewards the heroism you need if you're
going to push to the farthest edges of our frontier.
That heroism tells us every bit as much about the
nature of courage and sacrifice as the classic Medal of
Honor does. This story is about Judith Resnik, one of
(04:53):
the astronauts aboard the Space Shuttle Discovery on that summer
morning in nineteen eighty four. Judy was a brilliant engineer
who joined NASA along with five other women in the
late seventies and went through years of grueling training to
qualify to be on that shuttle. She was the second
(05:14):
American woman in space after Sally Ryde, and she understood
deep in her bones how risky her assignment was, but
she did it anyway. She persisted through that danger, not
because she wanted to be a woman in space as
some kind of token or ceiling breaker. She did it
(05:38):
because she had a job to do, a job she
was doing for her country, for all of us. She
would do that job until the morning she died at
the age of thirty six, free falling through the clear
blue winter sky. By the time Judy Resnik decided to
(06:14):
become an astronaut, she had been the only woman in
the room literally dozens of times. That's what you got
from being a female math, genius an engineer in the
late nineteen sixties and seventies. She was born in Akron, Ohio,
in nineteen forty nine. Her parents were first generation Jewish Americans.
(06:35):
Judy was exceptional from the start. She trained to be
a concert pianist, and she was amazing at it. She
spoke French. She was the only girl in the math
club in high school. She graduated first in her class,
and she was accepted early to the famous Juilliard School
of Music. But then Judy scored an eight hundred on
(06:59):
the math Porsche of her college SATs, the only female
high school student in the country that year to achieve
a perfect score. So she switched gears and enrolled at
Carnegie Mellon University to study electrical engineering. There were barely
any other women in the department, but she was getting
(07:19):
used to that. Judy graduated first in her class and
promptly started adding to her expertise designing radar control and
rocketree circuits at RCA, working in biomedical engineering at the
National Institutes of Health, getting her PhD in electrical engineering
with honors. But while success came easily, finding something to
(07:45):
spark her interest was harder. That all changed in nineteen
seventy seven, when NASA finally opened its applications to women.
Judy was twenty seven. NASA's decision was a long time coming.
Speaker 3 (08:04):
It was American men who first walked in space and
then set the first human footprints on a planet other
than Earth, and subsequent flights have remained a sort of
free floating bachelor party.
Speaker 1 (08:18):
This is from a documentary made in nineteen eighty three.
I can't tell if it's meant to be funny or what.
Speaker 3 (08:27):
From nineteen sixty until nineteen seventy seven, for reasons that
will forever remain unclear, NASA was unable to find a
single qualified woman candidate.
Speaker 1 (08:38):
Or as one woman put it, they trained a Tim
pan Z to go to space before they trained a
single female astronaut. Anyways, in the late nineteen seventies, NASA
had developed this space Shuttle. Unlike the old spacecraft, it
would be reusable, able to take trips a year, which
(09:01):
meant NASA would need more astronauts, and so finally women
were allowed in the door. Judy wasn't really that interested
in space until she happened to see the NASA recruitment
noticed on some bulletin board. This is Judy.
Speaker 4 (09:19):
I decided to apply to be an astronaut when I
was a graduate student finishing up my research work. It
was not something that I had planned to do for
my whole life. It was a case of being in
the right place at the right time. NASA was advertising
for astronauts at the time that I was looking for
a job.
Speaker 1 (09:37):
If she made it sound easy, it wasn't. More than
eight thousand people applied to become astronauts that year. Of those,
a little over a thousand were women. Judy worked hard
to stand out from the crowd, reaching out to astronaut
John Glenn an Apollo eleven pilot Michael and to learn
(10:00):
more about the space program. She got a pilot's license,
and while she waited to hear from NASA, she moved
to California and took a job with Xerox. Soon enough,
she was one of two hundred finalists invited to the
Johnson Space Center in Houston. Of those two hundred, only
twenty one were women. Judy submitted to a week of
(10:24):
interviews to physical test and mental ones. NASA recruiters needed
to know if these potential astronauts would respond badly to stress.
In January of nineteen seventy eight, Judy got the news
she would be one of six women accepted into the program.
(10:47):
At the press conference, she stepped onto the stage and
smoothed her skirt. She had straightened her dark, curly hair
and wore a nervous smile on her face.
Speaker 5 (11:01):
Mission Specialist. Her residence is Redondo Beach, California. Her present
position is engineering staff product development with the Xerox Corporation.
El Segunde.
Speaker 1 (11:15):
Judy moved to Houston with the rest of the thirty
five newly minted astronauts. She would train as a mission specialist.
Speaker 6 (11:23):
The mission specialist does things associated with the experiments on
board or deploying the satellites, while the pilots do most
of the flying of the orbiter.
Speaker 1 (11:34):
While she might not be flying the shuttle, the training
was still brutal and it would last for years. More
than any other of the six women, Judy was determined
to be seen as one of the boys. As she
once told her father quote that I don't want to
be a Jewish astronaut. I don't want to be a
(11:57):
Jewish woman astronaut. US want to be an astronaut period.
I just wanted to go in space and do my job.
A few years into her training, Tom Broker asked her
what it was like to break into that old boys club.
Speaker 7 (12:18):
Once you got into the program, wasn't there a little
bit of resentment or a little bit of male chauvinism
that was demonstrated to that's.
Speaker 1 (12:23):
A very male kind of fighter pilot world as you
were in Rick.
Speaker 2 (12:27):
Not at all.
Speaker 8 (12:27):
As a matter of fact, I think everybody leaned over
backwards to make sure that we were treated as equal
right from the beginning.
Speaker 1 (12:35):
This, of course, was not entirely true. Mike mullane was
also a mission specialist in Judy's class of astronauts, and
he remembers the men oggling her, teasing her with dirty jokes.
It sounds like training with a bunch of teenagers. One
time the guys put a live grass snake in her back.
(12:56):
They waited in the other room to hear her open
her purse, and which she did. I would have but
they respected her brilliance and reliability. Mulane has served as
an Air Force colonel before he joined NASA. He was
pretty tough. He had flown one hundred and thirty four
combat missions in Vietnam, and he remembers Judy this way quote.
(13:21):
I'd watched her fly formation from the backseat of T
thirty eight's and lead instrument approaches in bad weather and
do it as well as me. I'd washed a repel
off the side of the orbiter mock up in our
emergency training, parascel into the water in our survival training,
worked twenty feet underwater in a three hundred pounds spacesuit
(13:44):
in simulation. After simulation, she had instantly and correctly reacted
to countless emergencies. The other astronauts felt that they could
trust Judy with their lives. Plus, she was a really
good time. Here's Rhea Seddon, who is one of the
first female astronauts.
Speaker 9 (14:06):
She was really really bright, obviously very beautiful person, flirtatious, funny.
You know, if she was just a live wire, you know,
we would do the Happy Hours or we'd go on
these NASA trips, and Judy was just a star attraction.
She was just having a great time and was obviously
friends with everybody.
Speaker 1 (14:26):
NASA kept sending her out to do press, which Judy hated.
Journalists would ask her personal questions, questions they would never
ask a male astronaut like this Jim from tom Brookaw.
Speaker 5 (14:41):
Are there discussions on Houston about what happens.
Speaker 7 (14:43):
When men and women go into space for the first
time together? After all, if you're up there.
Speaker 5 (14:48):
In some kind of a prolonged space mission.
Speaker 7 (14:50):
And there may be even relationships that will develop between
men and women.
Speaker 8 (14:53):
Well, I think from our point of view, since we're
so used to working together professionally, that we look at
each other as profession colleagues on the ground, in orbit
and whatever, and we view it that way. Period.
Speaker 7 (15:05):
You think the time will come when there will be
a romance in the outer space, then oh gee, I
really couldn't tell.
Speaker 1 (15:09):
You that, Tom, what are you doing? Understandably, Judy started
to avoid the press. She sometimes would hide from reporters,
using her fellow astronauts as human shields. And then at
the start of nineteen eighty two, it became clear that
(15:30):
NASA was going to assign a woman to a shuttle crew.
Whoever it was would become the first American woman in space.
The female astronauts were more than ready. Judy had a
bright pink bumper sticker made that read a Woman's place
(15:51):
is in the cockpit. It looked like it was going
to come down to either her or Sally Ride. Ride
was a brilliant physicist and PhD who had married a
fellow astronaut. Sally was comfortable with the press, calm and
well spoken on TV. And then there was Judy, equally
(16:13):
brilliant but single, who cursed like a sailor, went out
dancing in nightclubs, and rolled her eyes whenever her gender
became part of the conversation. The decision, unfortunately, was probably
pretty clear. In April of nineteen eighty two, NASA announced
(16:34):
that Sally Ride would be the first American woman astronaut
in space. It would be two long years before Judy
would have her first brush with space. That day, when
Discovery's engines shut down on the launchpad and Judy realized
she might be about to die. In nineteen eighty four,
(17:14):
Judy Resnek was finally scheduled for emission to space. It
would be Discovery's maiden voyage, although, as Judy joked with
the other five astronauts, who were all men, quote, there
are no maidens on this voyage. Judy, as an expert engineer,
specialized in the operation of the mechanical arm, which was
(17:37):
controlled from within the cockpit but located outside the orbiter.
It was used to lift solar panels and position satellites.
Here's Judy describing what the team would be doing with
the arm during a TV interview.
Speaker 4 (17:52):
The remote Manipulator Arm will be used to take large satellites,
for example, out of the cargo bay and put them
into orb but the orbiter will act much like a bus,
and the satellite will be getting off at it's bus stop,
so to speak. We get to the right place in
the right time, and we'll pick it up with the arm,
and we'll put it where we want to let go,
and then back the orbiter away and leave it there.
Speaker 1 (18:15):
Operating the arm took incredible skill. Here's Tom Brokaw again
talking about Judy on a news broadcast.
Speaker 7 (18:23):
Despite her protestations that she couldn't do things better than
some of the men, all and men told me that
when she operated that big arm at the back of
the payload, she had a great touch, that she had
real dexterity.
Speaker 1 (18:35):
Discovery was set to launch in June. A few days
before lift off, Judy and a friend discussed who would
inherit her things if the mission went wrong and she
didn't return. Her friend asked if she was ready for
the risk, and Judy replied, quote, oh yeah, I know
what's involved, but it was about to become very real
(18:58):
for her. The astronauts boarded the Shuttle in the early
morning of June twenty fifth, but there was a problem
with the backup flight system computer. The liftoff was scrubbed
and rescheduled for the following day, that was June twenty sixth.
Same drew an early morning wake up entry through the hatch,
(19:22):
the astronaut's ears popping as the cabin was depressurized. Judy's father, brother,
and mother were watching from the Lodge Control Center, located
three miles from the launch site, at a safe distance
from any potential explosion. Then came countdown fifteen. The propellant
(19:43):
flowed to the solid rocket boosters, that pair of giant
rockets connected to either side of the orbiter, which provided
eighty five percent of the Space Shuttle's thrust at liftoff,
and for the first two minutes of a cent we
have main engines start and then the terrifying silence. Everyone
(20:09):
on board the shuttle was worried that the solid rocket
boosters would ignite when they were still on the ground,
tearing the shuttle apart. And then they heard crackling over
the intercom. There's a small fire on the launchpad. Here's
Mike Mullane, who was on that flight with Judy.
Speaker 10 (20:31):
And I'll never forget thinking there's no such thing as
a small fire when you're sitting on four million pounds
of repellent. That was a real terror. Hear the word fire.
That's the scaredest I think I've probably ever been in
my life, sitting out there wondering what the heck's going
on with that fire on the launch pad.
Speaker 1 (20:48):
In the grandstands, spectators had seen a bright flash as
the engines ignited. Some were convinced that they had seen
an explosion. Judy's mother bent her head and rested it
in her hands. It looked like she was praying. Water
began to spray against the shuttle windows. The crew unstrapped
(21:12):
from their seats and debated opening the hatch to make
an emergency escape. They didn't know that the fire outside
the shuttle was hydrogen, and hydrogen fires are invisible. They
might have unknowingly exited the hatch directly into the flames.
Fortunately they decided to wait. It was more than forty
(21:37):
minutes before the astronauts finally got out, but they survived.
At the press conference afterwards, they did what they had
been trained to do. They lied, and they said that
they hadn't been afraid at all. Judy said, quote, I
was disappointed, but I was relieved that the safety systems
(21:57):
do work. It was unfortunate that we had to check
them out, but it built confidence in the whole system.
In truth, the astronauts hadn't just been terrified of the
rockets blowing them apart or of the fire. Lift off
itself was dangerous, and the Shuttle wasn't designed with any
(22:18):
way for the crew to escape once it was airborne.
Here's Mike Mulane talking about the Shuttle on a Performance
Initiative podcast. He makes it so clear why the Shuttle
launch was terrifying for everyone on board. We didn't have
any way of bailing out of a shuttle. Of course,
you're not gonna be able to bail out.
Speaker 11 (22:38):
Of it in space or anything, but in the atmosphere,
if you had an escape system, you know, some type
of injection seats or pots or something, you might be
able to survive. But Shuttle didn't have any of that.
So fear is very very high on Shuttle launch.
Speaker 1 (22:53):
No way to escape, just let that sink in. Maybe
had intellectually known the risk of what she was doing,
but now I'm sure she really felt it. And yet
on August thirtieth, nineteen eighty four, when NASA made its
(23:13):
fourth attempt to launch Discovery. She was there and this
time lift off went exactly as planned.
Speaker 2 (23:24):
Three two when wed that's our reignition, and we had
lifted off, lifted off, and n D the first flight
and labor in the Discovery and the tuttle had cleared
the power.
Speaker 1 (23:37):
Judy Resnik became the second American woman in space. She
released satellites into orbit and conducted experiments on a giant
folding solar panel.
Speaker 4 (23:49):
This is the largest structure ever deployed in space. All
in all, it was a good flight test for large
space structures with potential future use in either space based
construction or in space station operations.
Speaker 1 (24:01):
Zero gravity turned Judy's curly hair into a cloud. She
had on gold rimmed aviator sunglasses and those short shorts
everyone wore in the eighties. She looked well glamorous. Back
on Earth, people weren't happy about that, but Judy was
just being herself as usual. While Discovery was circling our
(24:26):
planet at five miles per second, the crew filmed themselves,
eating and sleeping, even running on a treadmill.
Speaker 4 (24:35):
Exercise was part of our daily routine on orbit, just
like it is back here on Earth. Getting set up
on the treadmill takes a little bit longer on orbit,
but it feels just as good to quit.
Speaker 1 (24:47):
But there was one episode that did it make the
highlight real. The crew had been sent up with an
Imax camera. While it was filming, the camera caught a
lock of Judy's hair and so into the mechanics. Judy
was upset, but not because the other astronauts had to
cut off a chunk of her hair to set her free.
Speaker 10 (25:09):
Let me tell you, the press had the women under
a microscope and were looking for the slightest indication that
a woman was different than a man, and as a result,
the women were paranoid about displaying anything anything that would
remotely be construed as, Oh, you're different than a man.
Speaker 1 (25:32):
Mike Mulane remembers that when Judy's hair jammed up the camera,
the commander, Hank Hartsfield said he would call down to
mission control and tell them they were going to have
problems filming for the day.
Speaker 10 (25:45):
And Judy looked at him and I don't remember her
exact words, but basically it was, you know, I'm going
to cut your heart out if you so much as
say a word over the air. About my hair getting
caught in this thing. To us it was baffling, like
why it's the big deal, But it quickly bec came
apparent to us. What her concern was is that if
that was blabbed to the whole world, it would be
(26:06):
the thing. It wouldn't matter how well Judy did on
the mission, all the things she did, she would be
remembered as the woman who had her hair that jeopardized
the imaxian that you know, women are different than me
and their hair as long, you know that type of thing,
that's what the press would pick up on.
Speaker 1 (26:20):
She knew it. They fixed the camera and after six
days they returned home. Judy was thrilled. Surely now she
would be seen as an astronaut, not a woman astronaut.
But very soon the whole world would know her name
(26:41):
for a different reason. In nineteen eighty one, Judy got
(27:01):
the news that she had been hoping for. She was
scheduled for a second mission to space. It wasn't just
because she had shown again and again how brilliant and
professional she was. It was also because, to boosts public excitement,
NASA had decided to invite a civilian to join the mission.
(27:22):
Her name was Krista mccauliffe, a teacher from New Hampshire,
and they wanted a seasoned female astronaut to be on
the flight with her. They would be on the Space
Shuttle called Challenger. Judy, like most of the astronauts in
the Shuttle program, was initially skeptical about sending a civilian
(27:44):
into orbit, but she soon realized how alone and overwhelmed
mccaulloff felt, so she set up a series of coffee
dates and taught mccauliff about celestial mechanics and how the
combustion of the Shuttle's engines worked. She told her quote,
it's not as hard as they make it sound. Judy
(28:06):
was the only astronaut picked for the Challenger mission who
had experienced that brush with death on Discovery, and yet
she had total confidence in the Shuttle and in the program.
Here's a clip of her from an interview around that time.
Are you a bit scared?
Speaker 9 (28:23):
No, I'm not scared.
Speaker 10 (28:26):
Why not?
Speaker 4 (28:28):
We trained so heavily for all the contingencies, and we're
so familiar with the procedures that we can almost do
them in our sleep.
Speaker 1 (28:36):
But there were things that NASA and the engineers at
Morton Diacol, the company that made the solid rocket boosters,
didn't tell the astronauts think of the rockets kind of
like a giant stack of metal cans filled with highly
explosive propellant. Morton Diacol had designed thirteen foot ubber gaskets
(29:00):
called O rings to seal the joints of those cans
and keep the gas inside from leaking. If the O
rings did it work, hot gas would escape through the
casing of the rocket, causing an explosion, burning through everything
and everyone inside the shuttle. After Judy's first flight on Discovery,
(29:26):
the engineers who inspected the rockets were alarmed to see
that the O rings had traces of such between them.
That meant that for a few moments at least, the
O rings had failed to seal, and as Shuttle missions
kept flying, it was clear that the issue with the
rocket booster joints was getting worse. There was one particular
(29:50):
cause for concern, cold weather, which could make the O
rings more brittle. A brittle O ring would be too
inflexible to create that all important seal that kept the
gas from leaking out. But of course, the shuttle launched
from southern Florida freezing temperatures weren't supposed to be part
(30:13):
of the deal at all. The engineers and Morton thiacol
knew that in order to really address the issue, they
would have to take the shuttles offline, but this felt impossible.
For one thing, there was pressure within NASA to prove
that the Shuttle really could operate almost like an airplane
(30:36):
flying regular missions into space. The launch scheduled was already
played with delays and cost overruns. Add to that the
public excitement over the Teacher in Space program, which put
even more pressure on NASA to get the Shuttle aloft. Judy,
(30:57):
like all the astronauts, knew that ASSO would do whatever
it took to make Challenger launch on time. She even
joked with Tom Brokaw about it.
Speaker 7 (31:09):
I had an enthusiastic letter from her saying that she
was hoping I could come down and watch this one
because she was sure was going to go off on schedule.
We used to have a running dialogue about whether NASA
could keep to a schedule or not.
Speaker 1 (31:20):
But Judy was wrong. Liftoff was initially scheduled for January
twenty second, nineteen eighty six. That was postponed again, and
then again Finally, on January twenty seventh, it looked like
Challenger would launch. The crew made it inside the shuttle,
(31:44):
strapped in, and then they were delayed by an issue
with the handle on the hatch. By the time it
was fixed, the winds had kicked up and the launch
was scrubbed for the day, which brings us to Tuesday,
January twenty eighth. The Challenger was scheduled to launch at
nine thirty eight am, but the forecast looked bad a
(32:07):
record breaking cold snap by the night before. It was
clear to the engineers at Morton Thiocoll that the shuttles
should not fly. They presented their concerns to their bosses
and to NASA management. But NASA didn't want another delay,
not just because of the growing embarrassment, but because it
(32:32):
would put the rest of the year's mission schedule off track,
and the executives at Morton thiocol were just about to
enter into negotiations to keep their lucrative contract with NASA.
The engineers insisted it wasn't safe. The two sides argued
deep into the night, and then the engineers gave in.
(32:56):
The launch would go ahead as planned. None of the
astronauts or the millions of people who would be tuning
in to watch the first teacher go to space knew
anything about any of it. A few hours before liftoff,
the temperatures bottomed out at twenty degrees fahrenheit. Technicians use
(33:21):
brooms to remove icicles, some of them two feet long,
from the shuttle and the launch pad. At the crew quarters,
the astronauts woke up before dawn. They walked through press
and cheering fans to the van that would take them
to the launch pad. Judy was smiling in her blue jumpsuit,
her hair blowing in the cold breeze, and hand out
(33:44):
wave into someone in.
Speaker 12 (33:45):
The crowd in the difference to fight through now and
then they're so un followed by a Specialisty rests Ron
McNair pilot Mike Smith, followed by christ follow feature in
face Aunt Ellison on Azuka and Palos specialists Greg Jarvist
Big smiles today, considently getting into the van.
Speaker 1 (34:12):
Once they reached challenger, Judy took her seat at the
flight engineer's position behind the commanders and pilot's seats. Before
she got strapped in, she turned to mcculluff and said, quote,
the next time I see you we'll be in space.
At the grand stand, the crowd shivered in the icy air.
(34:33):
Judy's father was there, so were the families of all
the astronauts. Krista mcculluff's husband and kids, plus all of
her son's third grade classmates were there, cameras locked in
on their hopeful faces. The launch was delayed one hour,
(34:54):
then another, and another as they waited for the ice
on the shuttle to melt inside the crew cabin. The
astronauts were convinced that it would be canceled. Judy said, quote,
I hope we don't have to drive this down to
the better end again. But then at eleven twenty nine am,
(35:17):
the countdown began.
Speaker 3 (35:20):
See minus fifteen seconds.
Speaker 1 (35:22):
The engines were ready to fire. The instrument panel and
the cockpit showed the final seconds of the countdown. The
crew was.
Speaker 3 (35:31):
Ready eight seven six, we have main engines start.
Speaker 1 (35:37):
Millions of kids in classrooms across the country tuned in.
So did the engineers and Morton Thiokol, sitting in a
conference room sharing the same sick feeling holding hands.
Speaker 13 (35:54):
And lift on lift off of the twenty fifth Face
Shuttle mission, and as.
Speaker 2 (36:00):
The tower.
Speaker 1 (36:02):
As the shuttle launched sheets of ice more than three
feet wide fell off part of the launch pad. Even now,
the O rings were failing. Hot gas at more than
five thousand degrees fahrenheit leaked out of the side of
a solid rocket booster. A joint ruptured. The astronauts wouldn't
(36:26):
have known any of this, not yet. The shuttle shook
and rattled as it went higher into the atmosphere. It
was hard for the astronauts to read their instruments. As
they approached the speed of sound, Judy shouted in excitement
shit hot. At fifty eight seconds into the flight, a
(36:50):
bright orange flame flared at the bottom of the right booster,
and then it grew. It crept around the fuel tank,
acting like a blow torch, cutting in to the tank
and igniting it. But the instruments in the cockpit and
at Michigan Control still didn't show that anything was wrong.
Speaker 2 (37:11):
Downder go and thrown up.
Speaker 1 (37:15):
At seventy two seconds, the fuel tank burst apart into
a giant fireball. You can probably picture it right, the
huge white cloud, and then two streamers of smoke curling
away from one another, out and down a big y
(37:38):
in the clear blue sky. To the people in the
grandstand and watch it on TV. It wasn't clear what
they were seeing. Was this the thing that always happened?
Their cheers faltered, then faded for a moment. Michigan Control
(37:59):
was silent, and then my controllers.
Speaker 9 (38:03):
Here looking very carefully at the situation.
Speaker 4 (38:07):
Obviously a major malfunction.
Speaker 1 (38:10):
But inside Michigan Control they knew how bad it was.
There was no more data from the flight communication with
the astronauts. The down link was gone.
Speaker 2 (38:25):
We have no down link, Business Mission Control, Houston. We
have no additional word. At this time, the.
Speaker 1 (38:37):
Crew compartment had shot out of the blaze of rocket fuel,
Tumbling slowly. It was in a free fall towards the
Atlantic Ocean. It took two minutes and forty five seconds
for it to hit the water. It is believed that
the seven members of the crew were alive the whole
(38:57):
way down. Their oxygen would have been disconnected when the
shuttle blew apart. It's likely that they were suffocating in
their seats. After all, there was no escape system, no
ejection seats, no pods, nothing to do but watch out
(39:22):
the shuttles windows. As the unforgivenly hard surface of the
ocean got closer and closer. When we talk about heroism,
particularly on this podcast, it's often in terms of saving
(39:46):
lives of remarkable one man stands against terrible odds. But
I think we can also agree that there is this
kind of heroism that has less to do with safe
others and more to do with putting yourself at risk
in the name of a greater good. The astronauts of
(40:09):
the Shuttle program and the ones who came before and after,
were serious scientists, determined to learn more about the cosmos.
They were explorers at the outer edge of what we
know about our world. They weren't going to space for fun.
They were going there to work for us. Judy Resnik
(40:36):
was as clear eyed and analytical as they come. She
knew exactly what kind of risks she was taking, but
she felt the rewards outweighed the peril. They all did.
Ronald Reagan put it this way at the Challenger Memorial Service.
Speaker 13 (40:55):
This America was built on heroism and noble sacrifice. It
was built by men and women like our seven Star Voyagers,
who answered a call beyond duty, who gave more than
was expected or required, and who gave it little thought
of worldly reward.
Speaker 1 (41:18):
They named a public elementary school after Judy in her hometown,
and every year the students sing a song in her honor.
Call me a softie, but it really hits me in
the hearts. I think that's heroism in a nutshell, knowing
(42:07):
the risk and pushing ahead anyways because you're serving something
greater than yourself. Full throttle up, all systems Go. Medal
of Honor Stories of Courage is written by Meredith Rollins
and produced by Meredith Rollins and Jess Shane. Our editor
(42:30):
is Ben Nadafh Hoffrey. Sound design and additional music by
Jake Gorsky. Our executive producer is Constanza gayartro fact checking
by Arthur Gomberts, original music by Eric Phillips. Production support
by Suzanne gabber Special thanks to the NASA History Office
Performance Initiative Podcast and the Ronald Reagan Presidential Library. And
(42:56):
don't forget. We want to hear from you. Send us
your personal story of courage or highlight someone else's bravery.
Just email us at Medal of Honor at Pushkin dot fm.
You might hear your stories on future episodes of Metal
of Honor, or see them on our social channels at
Pushkin Pods. I'm your host JR. Martinez
Host
Malcolm Gladwell
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