How Your World Works

On January 28, 1986, when the space shuttle Challenger exploded 73 seconds into its mission, America changed in a profound way. The schoolchildren of America had been watching the launch with keen excitement, a schoolteacher among the crew. NASA was pursuing an ambitious launch schedule. Spaceflight was routine, regular, and something America was good at. Then came the Challenger tragedy. On this episode, we hear the voices of journalists, NASA staff, and civilians that lived through the disaster as author Margaret Lazarus Dean, an expert on the shuttle program, explains it.