Christa McAuliffe Christa McAuliffe Sharon Christa McAuliffe (born Sharon Christa Corrigan; September 2, 1948 – January 28, 1986) was an American teacher and astronaut from Concord, New Hampshire and one of the seven crew members killed in the Space Shuttle "Challenger" disaster. She received her bachelor's degree in education and history from Framingham State College in 1970 and also a master's degree in education, supervision and administration from Bowie State University in 1978. She took a teaching position as a social studies teacher at Concord High School in New Hampshire in 1983. In 1985, she was selected from more than 11,000 applicants
Christa McAuliffe to investigate the disaster. It determined that the accident was due to a failure of rubber O-rings made by Morton-Thiokol that provided a pressure seal in the aft field joint of the shuttle's right Solid Rocket Booster. The failure of the O-rings was attributed to a design flaw, as their performance could be too easily compromised by factors that included the low temperature on the day of launch. The Commission found that O-ring resiliency is directly related to temperature and due to the low temperature at launch—36 degrees Fahrenheit or 15 degrees lower than the next coldest previous launch—it was