Challenger Video: New Footage Of 1986 Space Shuttle Disaster Unearthed (VIDEO)

New Scientist has posted recently unearthed home video of the 1986 Challenger disaster that killed all seven crew members just 73 seconds after launch.

According to New Scientist, the video comes from Bob Karman, a nurse whose daughter works at the publication. Karman filmed the launch from the Orlando, Fla., airport where he was with his family after a trip to Disney World.

In the video, a group of spectators are initially unaware of the events going on before their eyes. Moments later, though, it's clear something's gone wrong.

For more about the video, click over to New Scientist.

This isn't the only home video of the launch. In 2010, footage from a neighborhood in Winter Garden, about 80 miles from the Kennedy Space Center launch site, surfaced. At the time, the Guardian wrote that "it is believed to be the only amateur film in existence of the world's worst space disaster."

The launch was also broadcast on live television.

Tragedy struck the shuttle program again in February 2003, when the space shuttle Columbia was lost upon entry over Texas. That accident also claimed the lives of all seven crew members.

NASA's Space Shuttle Program flew 135 missions between 1981 and 2011.

The remaining space shuttles in the fleet -- Enterprise, Discovery, Endeavour and Atlantis -- are being prepared for retirement and will be put on display at museums throughout the United States.

LOOK: Pictures related to Challenger mission:

CORRECTION: An earlier version of this story incorrectly identified Winter Garden as Winter Gardens.

Comments

[GenXer76]

02:20 PM on 05/07/2012

Could the woman who was talking during the entire video be any more annoying?

[TheLibraryOfCodex]

05:25 PM on 03/11/2012

Nine heroes emerged from this disaster.

The seven astronauts, Roger Boisjoly, and Richard Feynman.

[LBA7895]

12:46 PM on 03/09/2012

Why would anyone who saw it in 1986 want to see it again?

[deckercat]

02:51 PM on 02/29/2012

what about the several emergency air bottles that had 2 minutes and 45 seconds worth of life missing that were in the wreckage?

[LBA7895]

12:45 PM on 03/09/2012

What about the approximately 9 minutes it took them to fall into the ocean, then drown?

[deckercat]

05:23 PM on 03/10/2012

it took more like 2m & 45s.

[Abigaill Tomsen]

09:54 PM on 03/26/2012

and they didn't drown. If they were still alive during the descent, they hit the ocean at ~200mph. The impact would've killed them instantly.

[jodylynne]

07:06 PM on 02/28/2012

Yet another immature, distasteful comment. Grow up.

[naschkatze]

11:41 AM on 03/09/2012

That's sick.

[blackwednesday]

07:22 AM on 02/28/2012

I realize this is probably me just being picky...but the headline read: "New View Of Shuttle Disaster".

My first thought was: "OOh, something new about Columbia?" (the most recent one) - Wrong.

To me "New View Of Shuttle Disaster" implies that Challenger was THE shuttle disaster. Meaning the only one. When Challenger exploded, it became the owner of the word "Challenger". Much like Kleenex means "Tissue" now. This is also why you won't find many ships called "Titanic" after all these years. "Challenger" is no longer a word, but a "thing".

They could have just as easily said: "New View Of Challenger Disaster". The original headline also implies that the disintegration of Columbia was somehow less-disaster-y than Challenger....which isn't the case.

I guess, to me, this is being disrespectful to the crew of Columbia.

[blackwednesday]

07:50 AM on 02/28/2012

...also, Enterprise was never intended to actually go into orbit with a crew. It was for testing purposes only, and the cost to make it into the "regular" fleet was considered too much, so they built Atlantis.

[easylifestyles]

12:42 AM on 02/28/2012

Very nice post thanks for sharing

[Gcock10]

04:52 PM on 02/27/2012

GOD PUNISHES US EVERY TIME A REPUBLICAN IS SELECTED PRESIDENT, WHY?
REAGAN presided over Challenger explosion, and BUSH presided over TWIN TOWER 911.
why, why, why?

[CrazyCarl]

11:38 PM on 02/27/2012

Where to even begin with that comment.....

[Rambling Ruminations]

04:15 PM on 02/29/2012

I suggest you lie down and just take it easy...okay?

[banker67]

04:05 PM on 02/27/2012

I'm surprised there aren't more amateur videos. Were video cameras so rare then? How about old film? Of the thousands of people who were there, only two took film or video? Hmm.

[Padric OFish]

12:03 PM on 02/27/2012

Photo #15 is a pisser. The launch was pressed forward despite warnings. Why? The "Teacher In Space" program was Reagan's idea, and he had a national address scheduled for that evening. They wanted the shuttle up because Reagan was going to talk about it and the space teacher program. What a dick.

Astronaut Gregory Jarvis is buried about 15 miles from where I live.

[primary116]

11:51 AM on 02/27/2012

Space exploration has been a great inspiration, with some major tragedies as happens in all experimental work. Time for robots to take over.

[glenc128]

11:32 AM on 02/27/2012

BACK IN 86 IT WAS NEWS ALL DAY,NITE,DAYS, WEEKS,AND MONTHS,ITS NOT NEWS TODAY.

[LBA7895]

12:44 PM on 03/09/2012

If you had seen it happen, you could never forget it, Glen.
I did and I can't....
9 minutes they suffered on the way down. They were alive when they hit.
Cause of death= drowning

[Abigaill Tomsen]

09:56 PM on 03/26/2012

Cause of death - impact with the ocean at ~200mph ...

[TheLibraryOfCodex]

05:23 PM on 03/11/2012

News is dead

Now it's entertainment.

[Abigaill Tomsen]

11:19 AM on 02/27/2012

In the months after the explosion we were subjected to videos of it from every which way angle possible. Resurrecting someone's grainy VHS tape isn't news.
We should be using all this emerging technology to fix our own planet instead of wasting time, money, resources and lives attempting to explore other planets.

[Padric OFish]

12:04 PM on 02/27/2012

Are you kidding? Exploring other planets has taught us to understand *this* one. Ask yourself why Venus is so much hotter than Mercury, despite being millions of miles farther away from the sun. May Carl Sagan have mercy on your soul.

[08Voter]

03:56 PM on 02/27/2012

Tell us again why we should be concerned about Venus and Mercury.

[Abigaill Tomsen]

04:35 AM on 02/28/2012

I'll rephase my last sentence then, ".....and lives attempting to colonize other planets." Future colonization is the ultimate goal of sending people into space, no?
Exploration of other planets can be accomplished using probes, machines and robots without sacrificing human lives.

There is nothing on the moon, that's why we never went back. Terraforming Mars is a technology a millenium away, so why try and send people there now?

And if we are so overcrowded here that we need to live in sealed domes in space or other planets, we can do it much more safely on the poles, underwater or in the middle of the Sahara.

[CrazyCarl]

11:40 PM on 02/27/2012

Huh? What makes you think exploration of other worlds is a waste of "time, money, resources and lives"? If everyone thought that way you'd probably be living in a different country - if you were alive at all.

[Watching rock grow]

09:40 PM on 02/26/2012

When it happened I was outside all the way across Florida in Clearwater on the bluff overlooking the water. The formation in the sky was just huge. I will never forget it that day. When I saw the formation form I just knew it was the Challenger, and sure enough when I got home it was on the news. Terrible, when is government going to listen to the experts?

[RAMstein]

11:04 AM on 03/01/2012

It was not a government issue. The management of the private corporation that built the SRB's decided to OK a launch at cold temperatures despite their engineers' warnings. The government agency (NASA) took their recommendation. You can't blame that on the government. However, as an engineer I must ask a similar question: When is management going to listen to the experts?

[Joseph Veverka]

07:16 PM on 03/02/2012

Some day all the experts will always agree. What is surprising concerting the mode of transportation that this was not the rule rather than the exception. Very primitive way6 to travel into space.

[ms.understood]

08:57 PM on 02/26/2012

i still remember this. i was in elementary school when the explosion happened, but they let us out of school early that day. when i got home, my grandmother was watching it on the news, and then explained what happened. this was very sad for such a long time...and still, it's difficult to watch.

[The R]

10:38 PM on 02/26/2012

Same here, I was in second grade and it is forever etched in my memory.