Today Marks 27th Anniversary of Challenger Explosion
By: Karel Davis
Updated: January 28, 2013
Although it has been 27 years, the haunting images of streaming clouds of smoke and a fireball will always remind us of one of NASA's and our nation's greatest tragedies: The Challenger explosion.
On January 28th, 1986, and after repeated postponements of the launch, NASA finally gave the go-ahead for Challenger to lift off.
73 seconds into that launch, the six astronauts and New Hampshire school teacher Christa McAuliffe died when the shuttle blew up.
The main cause of the explosion was the failure of a seal in the right solid rocket booster due to the cold weather.
