Space Shuttle Challenger disaster recent, real-life Space Shuttle "Challenger" disaster. Punky and her classmates watched the live coverage of the shuttle launch in Mike Fulton's class. After the accident occurred, Punky is traumatized, and finds her dreams to become an astronaut are crushed. She writes a letter to NASA, and is visited by special guest star Buzz Aldrin. Although the episode received high ratings, NBC would, in the following weeks, decide to cancel the show. On the evening of April 5, 1986, the "Rendez-vous Houston" concert commemorated and celebrated the crew of the "Challenger." It featured a live performance by musician Jean Michel Jarre,
Space Shuttle program from the back of a specially modified Boeing 747, only for initial atmospheric landing tests (ALT). "Enterprise"'s first test flight was on February 18, 1977, only five years after the Shuttle program was formally initiated; leading to the launch of the first space-worthy shuttle "Columbia" on April 12, 1981 on STS-1. The Space Shuttle program finished with its last mission, STS-135 flown by "Atlantis", in July 2011, retiring the final Shuttle in the fleet. The Space Shuttle program formally ended on August 31, 2011. Before the Apollo 11 moon landing in 1969, NASA began early studies of space shuttle designs.