Thirty years after the explosion of the Challenger space shuttle, which resulted in the deaths of astronauts Michael Smith, Dick Scobee, Judith Resnik, Ronald McNair, Ellison Onizuka, Gregory Jarvis and Christa McAuliffe — a school teacher who was set to become the first "private citizen" to go to space — NASA will commemorate the tragedy, along with other catastrophes that have taken place since the initiation of the space program over five decades ago.
Others who will be memorialized at the event include the Apollo 1 crew (which consisted of members Roger Chaffee, Gus Grissom and Edward H. White), all three of whom were killed in a cabin fire during a test launch in 1967, and the Columbia space shuttle, which disintegrated over Texas and Louisiana due to damage obtained during its mission, killing members Rick D. Husband, William C. McCool, Michael P. Anderson, Kalpana Chawla, David M. Brown, Laurel Clark and Ilan Ramon, the first Israeli astronaut in space.
