Pic of the Week: 40 Years Since the Challenger Shuttle Disaster

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Image (Credit): The Challenger Shuttle crew from left to right – Teacher-in-Space payload specialist Sharon Christa McAuliffe; payload specialist Gregory Jarvis; and astronauts Judith A. Resnik, mission specialist; Francis R. (Dick) Scobee, mission commander; Ronald E. McNair, mission specialist; Mike J. Smith, pilot; and Ellison S. Onizuka, mission specialist. (NASA)

This week’s image shows the seven members of the Challenger Shuttle crew who perished less than two minutes into their flight on January 18, 1986. NASA determined that a leak in one of two Solid Rocket Boosters ignited the main liquid fuel tank.

Following the disaster, President Ronald Reagan had this to say:

I’ve always had great faith in and respect for our space program, and what happened today does nothing to diminish it. We don’t hide our space program. We don’t keep secrets and cover things up. We do it all up front and in public. That’s the way freedom is, and we wouldn’t change it for a minute. We’ll continue our quest in space. There will be more shuttle flights and more shuttle crews and, yes, more volunteers, more civilians, more teachers in space. Nothing ends here; our hopes and our journeys continue. I want to add that I wish I could talk to every man and woman who works for NASA or who worked on this mission and tell them: “Your dedication and professionalism have moved and impressed us for decades. And we know of your anguish. We share it.’‘

You can learn more about each of the crew members at this NASA site.

Television: Blade Runner 2099 Coming in 2026

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Credit: Gollancz

It seems two movies covering Philip K. Dick’s novel Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep? was not enough, so an entire television series is being readied by Amazon Prime for release this year.

Of course, Amazon Prime has been talking about this series since at least 2022, with the Motion Picture Association stating back then:

Blade Runner 2099 will no doubt continue these storylines, but considering it’s set a full 50 years after Villeneuve’s film, you can expect entirely new characters, plot points, and environments. Amazon has now proven itself successful working on a massively scaled genre series with the current success of its most ambitious project to date, Lord of the Rings: The Rings of Power. Blade Runner 2099 will provide the streamer with another major opportunity to continue the story of an already hugely popular franchise, with a fan base no less fervent than those who love Lord of the Rings.

I am not so sure that Amazon Prime’s Lord of the Rings: The Rings of Power is a good comparison since it was not a great success. Forbes magazine called it a flop, noting that:

Just under two-thirds of all Rings Of Power viewers quit watching the show before the finale, missing out on some truly ghastly television in the process. The big question I have is: Out of all the viewers who did stick around for all eight episodes, how many were hate-watching?

It also doesn’t help that (1) Blade Runner 2049 was a flop at movie theaters and (1) the main star in this new television series, Michelle Yeoh, was part of an already discussed movie flop last year with Star Trek: Section 31. Given that Oscar-winner Michelle Yeoh did well in the series Star Trek: Discovery, I blame the film creators more than the actors.

The good news is that Ridley Scott will be back at the helm on this new series. Denis Villeneuve gave us the Blade Runner 2049 film. While he was brilliant with the two Dune movies he crafted from the books, for some reason he could not make it work when expanding on another director’s work.

I am not seeing any specific premiere date, but the industry noise seems to be pretty upbeat about a 2026 release.

The odds are not in Amazon Prime’s favor, yet I am rooting as much as anyone else that this series is successful.

If You Happen to be in Kentucky…

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If you happen to be in Kentucky in late February, you may want to visit Thomas More University’s Observatory for a special lecture on astronomy. The lecture is titled “Please Stop Letting Astronomers Name Things,” and it will occur on Saturday, February 21st at 6pm.

Here is the write up for the talk:

From planetary nebulae to spaghettification, astronomers have a long tradition of giving confusing, misleading, or downright silly names to serious physical phenomena. This talk takes a humorous tour through the best and worst examples of astronomical naming. Along the way, we’ll see how names can clarify ideas, confuse students, and occasionally make astronomers cringe.

Maybe the lecturer will discuss oddly named objects such as the star named Gomez’s Hamburger or the Spirograph Nebula.

It sounds like an interesting lecture, and additional lectures are scheduled through the spring.

Space Stories: Moon Kills Earth Water Theory, Astronauts in Quarantine, and China Loses Two Rockets

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Credit: NASA

Here are some recent space-related stories of interest.

—Universities Space Research Association: “Our Moon’s 4 Billion-Year Impact Record Suggests Meteorites Didn’t Supply Earth’s Water“

A long-standing idea in planetary science is that water-rich meteorites arriving late in Earth’s history could have delivered a major share of Earth’s water. A new study by Universities Space Research Association (USRA) and University of New Mexico argues that the Moon’s surface record sets a hard limit on that possibility: even under generous assumptions, late meteorite delivery since about 4 billion years ago could only have supplied a small fraction of Earth’s water...In a paper published in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, researchers led by Dr. Tony Gargano at USRA’s Lunar and Planetary Institute and the University of New Mexico analyzed a large suite of Apollo lunar regolith samples using high-precision triple oxygen isotopes. Earth has erased most of its early bombardment record through tectonics, and constant crustal recycling. The Moon, by contrast, preserves a continuously accessible archive: lunar regolith, the loose layer of debris produced and reworked by impacts over billions of years

—Florida Today: “NASA Artemis Astronauts in Quarantine Ahead of Rocket Launch in Florida“

The four astronauts who will soon become the first humans in more than half a century to fly on a lunar mission have begun the quarantine process – a crucial sign that NASA believes a launch could be imminent. Sequestering themselves away from others for the next several days ensures that the three Americans and one Canadian selected for a mission known as Artemis 2 are at low risk of becoming sick and jeopardizing the mission. The crew members have entered quarantine in Texas as NASA makes final preparations in Florida to ready the towering rocket that will get the mission off the ground as early as February.

—Technology.org: “China’s Space Ambitions Hit Turbulence: Two Rockets Fail Within 12 Hours“

The Long March 3B departed Xichang Satellite Launch Center in southwest China at 11:55 Eastern (1655 UTC) on January 16. Amateur footage confirmed the rocket left the pad on schedule. Then came silence. The China Aerospace Science and Technology Corporation (CASC) waited nearly 12 hours before acknowledging what observers already suspected. “The specific cause is under further analysis and investigation,” state media Xinhua reported…Less than 12 hours after the Long March 3B failure, Galactic Energy attempted something the company had been working toward for months: the first flight of its Ceres-2 rocket. After repeatedly postponed launch windows, the solid-fueled rocket finally lifted off from Jiuquan Satellite Launch Center at 11:08 p.m. Eastern on January 16 (0408 UTC, January 17). It didn’t work. Galactic Energy confirmed an anomaly had occurred and that investigation was underway.

Space Quote: Ongoing Questions about the Orion’s Heat Shield

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Credit: Taken from a 2024 NASA Office of the Inspector General report – NASA’s Readiness for the Artemis II
Crewed Mission to Lunar Orbit (IG-24-011)

“What they’re talking about doing is crazy…We could have solved this problem way back when…Instead, they keep kicking the can down the road.”

-Statement by former astronaut Charlie Camarda, who does not believe the upcoming Artemis II mission is safe for the astronauts given his concerns about the Orion’s heat shield, as quoted by CNN. The news story cites others who state that the Orion heat shield issue has been resolved and the mission is ready to go. The Artemis II mission is set to launch as early as February 6th.