50 year Anniversary of the Apollo 1 fire

[bernomatic]

It's sad when an anniversary reminds us of a horrible accident. Yet I want to believe that Gus Grissom, Ed White, and Roger Chaffee didn't give their lives in vein , but in the hope of a brighter future in space exploration. That NASA has deemed it more sensible to not fully follow up on that dream to me is the bigger tragedy.

NASA space-mirror-memorial.jpg (440.04 KiB) Viewed 2777 times

[Joe Wooten]

I was 11 years old and clearly remember when it happened. Sad day.

[luke strawwalker]

My wife was about 8 months from being born at the time, and I wasn't even thought of for another 3 years...

It's amazing to consider how NASA reacted then compared to the prevailing attitude NOW... Back then NASA presented a distinct "we'll bounce back from this and get the job done" attitude, and they did, against all opposition, including some POWERFUL opposition in gubmint...

Now NASA is content to sit and TALK about exploration, *someday*, but with NO firm plans to do ANYTHING beyond navel-gazing and making pretty speeches, reaching out to the Muslim community, and doing climate studies and other nonsense... How the mighty have fallen...

Later! OL J R