Space... the Final Frontier

White
Grissom
Chaffee

Scobee
Smith
Resnik
Onizuka
McNair
Jarvis
McAuliffe

Husband
McCool
Anderson
Clark
Brown
Ramon
Chawla

Yesterday was the 40th anniversary of a fire that killed three men on a dry spot in the Florida swamp. Today is the 21st anniversary of an explosion that killed seven men and women in the skies over the Atlantic ocean. In a few days, it will be the fourth anniversary of an accident that killed seven men and women in the skies over Texas.

I’ve said it before, space travel and more to the point, space exploration is a dangerous business. It is also, and much more importantly, the best, most noble manifestation of what we human animals do. We explore. We become our best – or worst – when we reach for that which is just beyond our grasp.

Our species’ history as explorers is checkered at best, heinous and horrific at worst. Let’s let the seventeen men and women whose names are listed above, and the numerous others who died in less public ways along the path to the stars, be inspirations for us to be that best, most noble version of the human animal.

And let us not stop exploring space. Not for an instant.

“Roger Houston. Go at throttle-up.”

-Ed