Sunday 24 November 2013

Space Shuttle Challenger disaster

The Mirror dated Wednesday January 29th 1986
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The front and back covers of this edition of The Mirror (as the Daily Mirror called itself for a while) were unusual in that they were printed sideways.

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This was the 25 launch of the Space Shuttle since the first orbital flight in 1981 and the 10th using Challenger. The special commission appointed Ronald Reagan to investigate the accident found that NASA management were to blame for not heeding scientists’ warnings that the component that failed would be at risk if the launch was made in the weather conditions that prevailed on January 28th and that they had known of a potential fault with the component since 1977. A U.S. House Committee on Science and Technology investigation came to the same conclusions.
The Shuttle program was halted until September 1988 when the program was resumed. All went well until January 2003 when Columbia broke up on re-entry. The Space Shuttle program finally came to an end in July 2011.

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L Ron Hubbard died on January 24th 1986 following a stroke. He had made a living as an author of pulp fiction in the 1930’s and 40’s but then developed Dianetics - a way of improving an individual’s physical and mental health. Later he went on to expand these ideas into Scientology. He has been called both a messiah and a pathological liar, but what can’t be denied is that he led a fascinating life and is well worth Google’ing.

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I like the comment ‘if he hadn’t been there he wouldn’t have got hurt’. I am surprised though that he got away with keeping an axe under his bed for just such an event.

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Anne Robinson (yes, the Weakest Link Anne Robinson) waxing lyrical about Prince Charles.

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I could imagine this happening in the 1950’s but in 1986 it’s unbelievable. Could there be more to the story than is printed here, or was the Landlord really that out of touch with the world of the 1980’s? 

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Paul McCartney, Roger Daltrey, Bob Geldof and some other bloke. It says four stars but I say three stars and Phil Collins. 

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The Top 40 in all its variety. Number 3 should be ‘Walk of Life’. Number 39 is a version of one of my all time favourite Animals tracks ‘Don’t Let Me Be Misunderstood’ by a group even Google hasn’t heard of - Coltello Show Confederates.

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Palace intrigue just like in the olden days. Did Princess Anne really call Princess Dianna ‘the Dope’, or not? We commoners will never know. Or care.

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The usual pre-World Cup optimism. In fact England were pushed out of the Mexico World Cup in the quarter-finals by Argentina and more specifically by Diego Maradona and his ‘Hand of God’ goal. Argentina went on to win the tournament. Gary Lineker won the Golden Boot as the leading scorer.   

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