Xref: utzoo sci.space.shuttle:3572 rec.arts.tv:12768
Path: utzoo!utgpu!jarvis.csri.toronto.edu!rutgers!dptg!ulysses!nsscb!elephant!bei
From: bei@elephant.UUCP (Bob Izenberg)
Newsgroups: sci.space.shuttle,rec.arts.tv
Subject: Re: Did Challenger happen?
Summary: The movie will go like this...
Message-ID: <718@elephant.UUCP>
Date: 28 Aug 89 04:01:47 GMT
References: <1904@brwa.inmos.co.uk> <932@brazos.Rice.edu> <17591@ut-emx.UUCP>
Distribution: usa
Organization: Fortress Treadwell, Newark, NJ
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I just watched the Korean Air Lines docudrama on one of the cable pay
channels.  It isn't the best example of made-for-TV oversimplification,
but the formula it follows is likely the one the Challenger special will
obey.  Picture this:  some clips of the explosion, for background in case
you were thinking of some other Challenger disaster.  Then some scenes with
policy disagreements, probably over sending Christa McAuliffe up.  Expect
some photogenic aerospace engineer to spend some time pondering whether the
shuttle is ready to fly.  He'll roll over when an actor doing a real soap
opera backstabbing slimeball at either NASA or M-T shoots him down.
The truth about the way it happened would make poor television.  The movie
"Taps" has the military school commandant answer a confused cadet's question
about how someone could close the school by saying, "With the stroke of a pen."
Well, NASA and Thiokol managers doomed Challenger with the stroke of a
speakerphone.  They conference-called those 7 people to death.  The reality
of how small the thinking behind the launch decision will be overplayed, so
that the people buying the Enquirer will understand it.  Subtlety has no
place on commercial television.

--- Bob

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Bob Izenberg, Brandon Consulting [ ] {backbone!}(nsscb,attctc,cbis3)!bei
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