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Book excerpt: “Challenger” by Adam Higginbotham
Simon & Schuster
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British journalist Adam Higginbotham, author of “Midnight in Chernobyl: The Untold Story of the World’s Greatest Nuclear Disaster,” returns with his exhaustively-researched new book, “Challenger: A True Story of Heroism and Disaster on the Edge of Space” (Simon & Schuster), about the 1986 space shuttle disaster.
Read an excerpt below.
“Challenger” by Adam Higginbotham
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Flight Control Room One
Johnson Space Center, Houston
January 28, 1986, 8:30 a.m.
The coffee, as usual, was terrible: bitter and thin, the color of tea; almost certainly undrinkable. He filled a cup anyway, returned to his console, and plugged in his headset. It promised to be a long morning.
Steve Nesbitt had arrived at his office early, checking for the latest weather updates from the Cape before taking the short walk, out past the duck ponds to Building 30, and up in the elevator to Mission Control. But from what he’d already seen on TV, there was no way they would launch today: it was freezing down in Florida, and there were two-foot icicles hanging from the gantry. Space Shuttle mission 51-L seemed sure to face yet another delay.
Nesbitt had been with NASA public affairs for just over five years, and was there for the triumph of the first Space Shuttle launch in 1981 — helping to respond to a clamor of press and media inquiries from all over the world. Since then, he had become chief commentator for Mission Control, and delivered the live commentary from Houston on almost every one of the twenty-four shuttle flights. But he was still nervous.
Responsibility for translating the bewildering patois of engineering jargon and acronyms spoken by NASA engineers and astronauts into language the public could understand began with the launch countdown commentary that boomed from the loudspeakers at Cape Canaveral. After that — once the count reached zero and the spacecraft left the ground — everything that happened was on Nesbitt’s watch. There was no script, and he knew his words went out live to anyone watching a launch on television — either on the three national networks, on the recently launched cable channel CNN, or over NASA’s own dedicated satellite feed; he relied instead on his Ascent Events List, which mapped a series of milestones the shuttle would pass on its way to orbit, from the slow roll it would execute as it roared away from the launchpad to the moment its main engines cut out, at the edge of space.
The hushed environment of the Flight Control Rooms had been devised to concentrate the minds of each of the flight controllers on their own tasks, and only recently had a TV set been installed near the Flight Director’s console, to display images of the shuttle in flight. Nesbitt rarely had time to look at that, as he focused attention on the console in front of him. Here, he had access to real-time information about the spacecraft: on his headset, he could listen in to dozens of audio “loops” connecting groups of NASA engineers and flight controllers on the internal communications network; and on a pair of black-and-white monitors, he could see telemetry data transmitted back to Earth from the shuttle, columns of numbers updated every second describing any one of hundreds of technical parameters of its performance in flight.
With a couple of hundred feeds to choose from, Nesbitt had his regular preferences: “Flight Ops Procedures,” which included data on the shuttle’s engine performance, and the “Trajectory” display, which showed its speed, altitude, and downrange distance. Even with all this at his fingertips, Nesbitt found the live commentary nerve-racking, and practiced often. He took his duty of public service seriously, and hated it when other commentators took flight with flowery language, like Hollywood PR guys. He wanted to play it straight.
And yet, suffering from the effects of a cold he’d picked up the day before, even as the final countdown began, Nesbitt would have welcomed another launch delay: his throat was sore, and he wasn’t certain he could talk through the whole ascent without his voice straining or cracking. He waited in silence for his cue: for the shuttle engines and the giant solid rockets to light; for his counterpart at the Cape to announce that Challenger had cleared the tower.
It was almost exactly 11:38 in the morning when Nesbitt saw the numbers on his screen start to move, and a few seconds later keyed his mike to speak:
“Good roll program confirmed. Challenger now heading downrange.”
At the console position next to him, the flight surgeon — a navy doctor in full uniform — had her eyes on the big TV set across the room. It was a perfect launch. Challenger was less than half a minute into flight when Nesbitt gave his next update.
“Engines beginning throttling down, now at 94 percent,” he said. “Normal throttle for most of the flight is 104 percent. We’ll throttle down to 65 percent shortly.”
The flight surgeon watched the shuttle climb higher into the cloudless sky over the Atlantic; Nesbitt kept his gaze on the monitors. “Velocity 2,257 feet per second,” he said. “Altitude 4.3 nautical miles, downrange distance three nautical miles.” The numbers all looked good; at sixty-eight seconds, he reported the next key moment on the list in front of him. “Engines are throttling up. Three engines now at 104 percent.”
Ten feet away, down on the next row of consoles, astronaut Dick Covey confirmed the change with the shuttle commander: “Challenger, go at throttle up.”
“Roger, go at throttle up.”
The spacecraft was one minute and ten seconds into flight.
Four seconds later, Nesbitt heard a loud crackle in his headphones. Beside him, the surgeon saw Challenger abruptly obscured by a ball of orange and white flame.
“What was that?” she said.
But Nesbitt was staring at his monitors.
“One minute fifteen seconds. Velocity 2,900 feet per second,” he said.
“Altitude nine nautical miles. Downrange distance seven nautical miles.” Then Nesbitt looked up, and followed the surgeon’s gaze toward the TV set. Something terrible had happened. There was no sign of Challenger, just the expanding fireball where it had once been — and the exhaust trails of the shuttle’s two booster rockets, twisting in opposite directions across the sky. His console was no help: the data streams had frozen. Around him, the other flight controllers sat stunned, faces slack with shock. No one said a word.
Nesbitt knew he had to speak, but he had no information to explain what he was witnessing. His mind raced. He thought of his responsibility to the public, and to the astronauts’ families. He thought, suddenly, of the attempt on Ronald Reagan’s life nearly five years before: in the confusion that followed, CBS news anchor Dan Rather had announced that White House press secretary James Brady had been killed — only to discover that Brady, despite the bullet in his head, remained very much alive. Nesbitt didn’t want to make a mistake like that.
A few moments of quiet extended into half a minute. An agonizing silence enveloped the NASA commentary loop; an eternity of dead air. On the TV screen, the cloud drifted in the wind; fragments of debris fluttered toward the ocean. The Flight Director polled his team in vain for answers.
It was forty-one seconds before Steve Nesbitt spoke again.
“Flight controllers here looking very carefully at the situation,” he said, his voice flat and impassive. “Obviously a major malfunction.”
Excerpted from “Challenger: A True Story of Heroism and Disaster on the Edge of Space” by Adam Higginbotham. Published by Avid Reader Press/Simon and Schuster. Copyright © 2024. All rights reserved.
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One of 43 monkeys bred for medical research that escaped a compound in South Carolina has been recovered unharmed, officials said Saturday.
Many of the others are still located a few yards from the property, jumping back and forth over the facility’s fence, police said in a statement.
The Rhesus macaques made a break for it Wednesday after an employee at the Alpha Genesis facility in Yemassee didn’t fully lock a door as she fed and checked on them, officials said.
The monkeys on Friday were exploring the outer fence of the Alpha Genesis compound and were cooing at the monkeys inside. The primates continued to interact with their companions inside the facility on Saturday, which is a positive sign, the police statement said.
Yemassee Police Department
Alpha Genesis CEO Greg Westergaard relayed that efforts to recover all the animals will persist throughout the weekend and for as long as it takes, the statement said.
Westergaard told CBS News on Thursday that a caretaker inadvertently failed to secure a door at the enclosure, allowing the monkeys to roam free.
“It’s really like follow-the-leader. You see one go and the others go,” he said. “It was a group of 50 and 7 stayed behind and 43 bolted out the door.”
Westergaard acknowledged that it would be a long process to get them back and that they didn’t want to chase the monkeys because that would spook them and make them run away.
“We’ve got them very close,” he told CBS News. “This is all like what we want to see.”
The monkeys are about the size of a cat. They are all females weighing about 7 pounds.
Alpha Genesis, federal health officials and police all said the monkeys pose no risk to public health. The facility breeds the monkeys to sell to medical and other researchers.
Alpha Genesis provides primates for research worldwide at its compound in Yemassee, about 50 miles (80 kilometers) northeast of Savannah, Georgia, according to its website.
A 31-year-old American tourist was killed while on vacation in Hungary’s capital, and the suspect, a 37-year-old Irish man, has been arrested, Hungarian police said Saturday.
The victim, Mackenzie Michalski was reported missing on Nov. 5 after she was last seen at a nightclub in central Budapest.
A Facebook group called “Find Mackenzie Michalski,” created on November 7, said Michalski, went by “Kenzie.” The group confirmed her death in a statement on Friday, thanking U.S. and Hungarian authorities for “their prompt attention, diligence, care, and consideration.”
Police launched a missing person investigation and reviewed security footage from local nightclubs where they observed Michalski with a man later identified as the suspect in several of the clubs the night of her disappearance.
Police detained the man, an Irish citizen, on the evening of Nov. 7. Investigators said that Michalski and the suspect met at a nightclub and danced before leaving for the man’s rented apartment. The man killed Michalski while they were engaged in an “intimate encounter,” police said.
The suspect, whom police identified by the initials L.T.M., later confessed to the killing but said it had been an accident. Police said that he had attempted to cover up his crime by cleaning the apartment and hiding Michalski’s body in a wardrobe before purchasing a suitcase and placing her body inside.
He then rented a car and drove to Lake Balaton, around 90 miles southwest of Budapest, where he disposed of the body in a wooden area outside the town of Szigliget.
Video released by police showed the suspect guiding authorities to the location where he had left the body. Police said the suspect had made internet searches before being apprehended on how to dispose of a body, police procedures in missing person cases, whether pigs really eat dead bodies and the presence of wild boars in the Lake Balaton area.
He also made an internet search inquiring about the competence of Budapest police.
Michalski’s parents are currently in Budapest, police told The Associated Press.
Friends posted condolences on the Facebook group of candles. Michalski was a nurse practitioner, the social media post said, who used “her humor, positivity, and limitless empathy to help heal her patients and encourage family and friends alike.”
Two years of record-breaking drought have dealt a heavy blow to what is arguably the Amazon’s most successful sustainable economy: the managed fishery for the giant pirarucu.
In Brazil´s Amazonas state, almost 6,000 riverine dwellers authorized to fish have reported a sharp drop in production and rising costs. They are demanding aid from the federal government and debating how to adapt to climate change.
Last year’s catch totaled 70% of the government-authorized quota of 100,443 fish. This year could see an even steeper decline, since many communities still haven´t been able to fish. The season runs from June 1 to Nov. 30.
Jorge Saenz / AP
Pirarucu managed fishing began in the Amazon 25 years ago in the Mamiraua region and has since expanded. It helped the Amazon’s largest fish escape risk of extinction and is now an important source of income for locals in 10 sustainable conservation units and eight Indigenous territories, where deforestation is close to zero.
Unlike other aquatic species of the Amazon, such as river dolphins, the pirarucu — also known as arapaima — historically have proven resilient to drought and climate change. But low water levels are making it extremely difficult for fishers to transport their catch from remote lakes to major rivers and onto cities.
It’s a mammoth task. The pirarucu, which can weigh up to 200 kilograms (440 pounds), lives in large lakes that during flood season are often connected to major rivers. Fishing typically occurs when water levels begin to recede, making it easier to trap the fish and transport them out in small boats or canoes. In several areas, however, water levels dropped so quickly that this connection was cut off before fishing could begin.
In the São Raimundo community in the Medio Jurua region, fishing is scheduled to start Saturday, a two-month delay — a common situation this season. As a result, Coletivo Pirarucu, an umbrella organization that represents 2,500 riverine and Indigenous families, has requested that the federal government extend fishing season until the end of January.
Even in large rivers navigation has become problematic, raising costs and uncertainty among fishermen. It usually takes three to four days to transport fish from Carauari municipality — a major pirarucu producer — to Manaus, the Amazon´s largest city. During the peak of the drought, the trip increased to 10 days, and the freight price has doubled.
Tough as pirarucu are, they are not immune to climate change, according to researcher Adalberto Luis Val from the National Institute for Amazonian Research. He says rising temperatures and severe droughts are exacerbating the “death trio” for all fish: warmer water, more CO2 and less oxygen.
The pirarucu has evolved to breathe air but is far from invincible.
“No fish can regulate body temperature,” Val said. “Then there’s water scarcity. As its level drops, you start to get a high amount of suspended material, leading to sludge buildup. It sticks to the gill area, blocking the processes that occur there.”
Fearing deteriorating conditions in the following decades, Coletivo Pirarucu contends that the fishermen should be entitled to compensation for losses caused by climate change. “This crisis not only challenges the resilience of communities but also highlights the urgent need for climate change adaptation and mitigation strategies,” the nonprofit stated in an open letter last week.
In an e-mail response, James Bessa, a federal official overseeing pirarucu management, said that Ibama, Brazil´s environmental agency, is working with other public bodies and local fishing associations to reduce the impact of extreme events like droughts and floods. He said there are plans to start scientific studies and closer monitoring to provide insights into ways to support riverine and Indigenous communities in sustaining their fishing activities.
Adevaldo Dias — a riverine leader who presides over the Chico Mendes Memorial, a nonprofit that assists traditional non-Indigenous communities — argues that adopting additional public policies to help the fishermen is a matter of climate justice.
“The Indigenous and riverine peoples have minimal impact on the environment,” Dias said. “We know that conserving the forest benefits both us and those outside it. And when extreme climate events occur, they are the most vulnerable.”
