--- title: Challenger Space Shuttle Disaster: Jan. 28, 1986 description: Read TIME's original cover story about the NASA tragedy canonical: https://time.com/3685686/1986-challenger-disaster/ author: Lily Rothman article:opinion: false article:content_tier: free article:published_time: 2015-01-28T16:10:15.000Z article:modified_time: 2026-05-11T05:05:59.689Z article:section: History og:title: Challenger Space Shuttle Disaster: Jan. 28, 1986 og:description: Read TIME's original cover story about the NASA tragedy og:url: https://time.com/3685686/1986-challenger-disaster/ og:site_name: TIME og:image: https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/blt0977082f062eaa83/69877c4fcd684882e30995fa/1101860210_400.jpg?branch=production&width=400&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=16:9 og:image:width: 400 og:image:height: 225 og:image:alt: Challenger Cover og:type: article twitter:card: summary_large_image twitter:title: Challenger Space Shuttle Disaster: Jan. 28, 1986 twitter:description: Read TIME's original cover story about the NASA tragedy twitter:image: https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/blt0977082f062eaa83/69877c4fcd684882e30995fa/1101860210_400.jpg?branch=production&width=400&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=16:9 ---  # How the Challenger Disaster Happened  by [Lily Rothman](https://time.com/author/lily-rothman/)  ## Lily Rothman Rothman is managing editor at TIME. Jan 28, 2015 4:10 PM UTC  The Feb. 10, 1986, cover of TIME The Feb. 10, 1986, cover of TIMECover Credit: BRUCE WEAVER  by [Lily Rothman](https://time.com/author/lily-rothman/)  ## Lily Rothman Rothman is managing editor at TIME. Jan 28, 2015 4:10 PM UTC When the Space Shuttle Challenger lifted off on Jan. 28, 1986, space flight was supposed to be safe. As TIME noted in a cover story that ran in the Feb. 10 issue of that year, NASA had spent 25 years sending Americans into space, at an average pace of about twice a year. That aura of safety was part of the reason why Christa McAuliffe, a teacher from New Hampshire, was on board, the first non-astronaut to have that privilege. It was also part of the reason why what happened to the Challenger on that day was so shocking. As the nation watched live, “McAuliffe and six astronauts had disappeared in an orange- and-white fireball nine miles above the Atlantic Ocean,” TIME reported. “So too had the space shuttle Challenger, the trusted $1.2 billion workhorse on which they had been riding.” What went wrong? It was not immediately clear _why_ things had turned sour, even as the launch procedure seemed to be going perfectly. But, as TIME explained in the diagram below, which ran with a story in that issue about how NASA was investigating the disaster, the _what_ was a fire that started in an external fuel tank:  From the Feb. 10, 1986, issue of TIME TIME Diagram **_Read the full cover story, as well as obituaries of each of the seven crew members, here in the TIME Vault:_**[Space Shuttle Challenger](http://time.com/vault/issue/1986-02-10/page/1/) ```json [{"@context":"https://schema.org","@type":"NewsArticle","@id":"https://time.com/3685686/1986-challenger-disaster/","mainEntityOfPage":{"@type":"WebPage","@id":"https://time.com/3685686/1986-challenger-disaster/"},"headline":"How the Challenger Disaster Happened","datePublished":"2015-01-28T16:10:15.000Z","dateModified":"2026-05-11T05:05:59.689Z","description":"Read TIME's original cover story about the NASA tragedy","url":"https://time.com/3685686/1986-challenger-disaster/","keywords":["Space","NASA","Science topic"],"thumbnailUrl":"https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/blt0977082f062eaa83/69877c4fcd684882e30995fa/1101860210_400.jpg?branch=production&width=1200&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=1200:675&height=675","author":[{"@type":"Person","name":"Lily Rothman","jobTitle":"Rothman is managing editor at TIME.","url":"https://time.com/author/lily-rothman/"}],"articleSection":"History","image":[{"@type":"ImageObject","url":"https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/blt0977082f062eaa83/69877c4fcd684882e30995fa/1101860210_400.jpg?branch=production&width=1200&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=1200:675&height=675","width":1200,"height":675,"headline":"Challenger Cover","caption":"Challenger Cover","creditText":"Cover Credit: BRUCE WEAVER","representativeOfPage":true}],"publisher":{"@type":"Organization","name":"Time","url":"https://time.com/","logo":{"@type":"ImageObject","url":"https://time.com/images/logo.png","width":528,"height":156},"foundingDate":"March 3, 1923","sameAs":["https://www.facebook.com/time","https://www.instagram.com/time/?hl=en","https://twitter.com/time","https://www.pinterest.com/timemagazine"]}},{"@context":"https://schema.org","@type":"BreadcrumbList","itemListElement":[{"@type":"ListItem","position":1,"item":{"@id":"/section/history/","name":"History"}},{"@type":"ListItem","position":2,"item":{"@id":"/tag/space/","name":"Space"}},{"@type":"ListItem","position":3,"item":{"@id":"https://time.com/3685686/1986-challenger-disaster/","name":"How the Challenger Disaster Happened"}}]}] ```