Post Challenger Explosion flight missions question?

Question

I remember the day well, i was in grade school and in Strings so we had P.E. after everyone else. So we joined the other kids to watch the shuttle launch, late.

It took nearly 3 years for NASA to get back into launching the shuttle into space.

But here's my delima.

When they were testing things, I swear i remember a lot of footage on tv of rockets exploding. I remember it reminded me of the days when the old rockets would go buzerk on and off the pad.

History says only three flight crews died in the space program: Apollo 1, Challenger, Columbia.

My question is two parts:

1. Was there rockets that launched and exploded? i seem to recall some of these were mostly just satelite launches. But i wonder how bad NASA was those days.

2. were any of these explosions manned?

Answer 1

A lot of rockets exploded during testing in the early stages of US manned space flights, but they were all unmanned. The reason they exploded is because they were missile launching vehicles. Safety was not an issue until NASA wanted to use them as launch vehicles for their manned flights. They had to be modified for safety before putting a man on board. During testing of the Mercury launches, 1 in 7 exploded.  The rate was even higher for the Titan vehicles which launched the Gemini capsule, but all the problems were fixed before the manned launches began.  NASA wasn't bad at all in those days. They didn't design the launch vehicles.  The launch vehicles were designed by the US military.  It was NASA's concern for safety that led to the success of the missions.  The Soviets lost more men in space than the United States. They were more concerned with being the first at something than doing it right.

Your history is lacking the crew of Gemini 9 who died when their plane crashed into a McDonnell aircraft hangar in St. Louis on February 28, 1966. Elliott See (Command Pilot) and Charles Bassett (Pilot), died four months before the mission. Thomas Stafford and Eugene Cernan flew the mission instead.