SALT LAKE CITY (ABC4) — Forty years after the Challenger disaster, the tragedy is remembered not only for the seven lives lost, but for the engineer who tried to stop the launch and was ignored.
The date was January 28, 1986. A space shuttle called the Challenger was supposed to launch from Florida. The seven on board were hoping to study Haley’s comet among other objectives. Nearly 73 seconds after taking off, the Challenger exploded, killing everyone on board.
While the world mourned the loss, it hit Bob Ebeling, a long-time Utah resident, particularly hard.
This is something that haunted Ebeling for years. He was one of the people who tried to stop the shuttle from launching that exploded years ago and replayed that night in his head for years…