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This Happened—January 28: Space Shuttle Challenger Disaster


As it was being watched live by millions, the Challenger space shuttle suddenly exploded 73 seconds after launch, killing everyone aboard. It happened on this day in 1986.

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What was the Challenger mission?

The crew had the mission of deploying a communications satellite and studying Halley's Comet while they were in orbit, in addition to the task of taking school teacher Christa McAuliffe into space.

Why did the Challenger explode?

A failure of the shuttle's right solid rocket booster (SRB) caused by record-low temperatures of the launch, and allowed hot pressurized gas from within the SRB to leak and burn the surrounding machinery. The failure of the internal system through the shuttle at incredible speed with aerodynamic forces that tore the ship apart.

Who was aboard the Challenger?

There were 7 crew members onboard, including F. Richard Scobee, the Commander, pilot Michael J. Smith, Mission Specialists Ronald McNair, Ellison Onizuka and Judith Resnik, Gregory Jarvis a Payload Specialist and Christa McAuliffe, a Payload Specialist and teacher from Concord, New Hampshire.

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Geopolitics

Au Revoir Françafrique? Macron Tries To Bury The French Colonial Mindset In Africa

French President Emmanuel Macron has outlined a new policy for France's relationship with Africa, recognizing the need for a departure from post-colonial mindsets. But he faces challenges at home and abroad.

Photo of ​France's President Emmanuel Macron (L) welcoming his Senegalese counterpart Macky Sall (R) at the Elysee presidential palace before their bilateral meeting, in Paris on June 10, 2022.

Macron welcomes his Senegalese counterpart Macky Sall at the Elysee last June

Ludovic MARIN / AFP
Pierre Haski

-Analytics-

PARIS — One cannot accuse Emmanuel Macron of being unaware that Africa has changed — and that France's approach to the continent must change too. As early as his election in 2017, the French President expressed this sentiment in a speech to students in Ouagadougou in Burkina Faso, and reiterated it last year at the Africa-France Summit in Montpellier, where he once again spoke to the younger generation.

He has finally outlined the contours of a new policy that breaks with a colonial past, which is still not forgotten, before embarking on an important trip to Central Africa (Gabon, Angola, Congo, Democratic Republic of Congo) on Wednesday.

The problem is that changing direction is particularly difficult when burdened with the weight of colonial and post-colonial history, as well as France’s misguided old reflexes.

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