I remember getting up in the middle of the night to watch the televised launch of Challenger. Once the shuttle cleared the tower shortly after 2am, I went outside and looked down the street to see the flame from the rockets light up the sky form 150 miles away. OK, maybe not light up the sky but it was visible as an orange light rising in the distance.
This was Challenger’s third flight in a row and carried the first African-American astronaut, Guion Bluford. The shuttle was in-orbit during the Soviet shoot down of Korean Airlines KAL-007 on September 1, 1983.
