STS-118 to regulate, monitor, and shut them down in case of trouble; the new system extends and improves the monitoring capability for increased safety.) "Endeavour" also received several systems that the other orbiters had already been equipped with, such as a glass cockpit, improved wing leading-edge sensors and the OBSS. STS-118 included mission specialist Barbara Morgan, the first Mission Specialist Educator. Morgan trained as the backup to Christa McAuliffe, NASA's Teacher in Space candidate from 1985 to 1986. McAuliffe was killed in the space shuttle "Challenger" accident on 28 January 1986. While McAuliffe and Morgan were classified as spaceflight participants and
Christa McAuliffe (1922–1990) of Irish descent and Grace Mary Corrigan ( 1924-2018 ) (née George), a substitute teacher, whose father was of Lebanese Maronite descent. McAuliffe was a great niece of Lebanese-American historian Philip Khuri Hitti. She was known by her middle name from an early age, although in later years she signed her name "S. Christa Corrigan", and eventually "S. Christa McAuliffe". The year she was born, her father was completing his sophomore year at Boston College. Not long thereafter, he took a job as an assistant comptroller in a Boston department store, and they moved to Framingham, Massachusetts, where she