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NASA will commemorate three space tragedies this week, which also marks the 25th anniversary of the shuttle Challenger accident that killed seven astronauts. The space agency will also pause to remember the 2003 loss of the shuttle Columbia and its crew and the earlier Apollo 1 fire that killed three astronauts.

"It just always gives us pause at this time of the year, those of us that are in the industry, to reflect on our sad experiences in the past and the lives of those that made such a great contribution to our country," said Wayne Hale, a former space shuttle program manager and flight director who was working at NASA during both space shuttle accidents.

The somber week will begin on Thursday, Jan. 27 – the 44th anniversary of the day three astronauts died when a fire broke out in their Apollo 1 module during a ground test roughly a month before launch. On that day in 1967, Apollo astronauts Virgil I. "Gus" Grissom, Edward H. White II and Roger B. Chaffee perished in what was then NASA's first major tragedy.

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Millions of students were watching when the space shuttle Challenger broke apart just after liftoff on Jan. 28, 1986, killing all seven members of its crew, including America's first teacher astronaut, Christa McAuliffe.

The sudden loss devastated people around the world, but especially those schoolchildren and teachers who had felt a special connection with the mission because of the presence of one of their own. Now, a quarter of a century later, teachers and students will join NASA in commemorating the 25th anniversary of the accident Friday.

"Twenty-five years ago I was a teacher, and I remember: 'This is this moment when a teacher, one of us who will teach kids and inspire, is going to space.' And then to have this terrible thing happen, it was a deep moment for our entire nation," said Dan Barstow, president of the Challenger Center for Space Science Education. "This was a very difficult time to question our capacity, our spirit of exploration, our educational approaches."

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The Apollo 1 Fire: NASA's First Disaster

On Jan. 27, 1967, NASA experienced its first space disaster - the deaths of three astronauts during a training excercise for the Apollo 1 mission. Pictured are the three Apollo 1 prime crewmembers intended for the first manned Apollo space flight: (L to R) Edward H. White II, Virgil I. "Gus" Grissom, and Roger B. Chaffee. A fire inside the Apollo Command Module during a test took the lives of all three astronauts. NASA had not experienced a disaster of this magnitude previously.

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The 1986 Challenger accident, as well as the Columbia tragedy that followed 17 years later, could have been prevented. That's the uncomfortable truth NASA lives with today. The signs of malfunctioning hardware were there in both cases well before the fatal flights.

There were oversights, misjudgments, shortcuts -- all well-intentioned, but with unforeseen and ultimately disastrous consequences. NASA fixed the faulty equipment, nursed its wounded pride and tried to rebuild its shattered reputation. It soldiered on.

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