Word: boosterism
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Dates: during 1980-1989
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Recovery of the shuttle's right solid fuel rocket booster is particularly important because speculation about the cause of the explosion currently centers on it. Videotape and still photos taken after launch show a plume of fire shooting out from its side toward the external fuel tank, which blew up into a giant fireball...
...slowly drifting parachute had given viewers a fleeting hope of human survival. News reports first indicated that a frogman had chuted into the ocean in a quick look for any survivors. But officials soon corrected both impressions: the falling parachute was one of the two that normally drop the boosters into the sea for salvaging and reuse of its parts. This one held a booster nose cap, which was retrieved two days later...
...gusts up to 35 m.p.h. began sweeping across the Kennedy Space Center. Any malfunction immediately after lift-off would call for an "RTLS," return to launch site. Either Scobee or Smith could fire bolts that would release the orbiter from its external fuel tank and two booster rockets. Challenger could then loop swiftly back to Kennedy's landing strip. Nonetheless, the crosswinds were too strong for a sure landing. No such emergency had ever been encountered, but once again NASA took the prudent course: yet another delay...
Although attention at week's end was focusing on a possible burn-through of the casing on one of the shuttle's two solid-fuel booster rockets, Space Flight Director Jesse Moore warned against premature speculation, saying "it will take all the data and a careful review of those data before we can draw any conclusions...
...Challenger. A fleet of 13 vessels, four planes and nine helicopters began searching an area that eventually grew to 6,000 sq. mi. of Atlantic coastal waters, picking up thousands of pounds of wreckage, including a large section of the shuttle's fuselage and the nose of a booster rocket...