Space Shuttle Challenger disaster buried in Rest Lawn Memorial Park in Lake City, South Carolina. Christa McAuliffe's remains are buried at Calvary Cemetery in her hometown of Concord, New Hampshire. Gregory Jarvis was cremated, and his ashes scattered in the Pacific Ocean. Unidentified crew remains were buried communally at the Space Shuttle "Challenger" Memorial in Arlington on May 20, 1986. As a result of the disaster, several National Reconnaissance Office (NRO) satellites that only the shuttle could launch were grounded because of the accident. This is a dilemma NRO had feared since the 1970s when the shuttle was designated as the United States' primary
Space Shuttle retirement Space Shuttle retirement The retirement of NASA's Space Shuttle fleet took place from March to July 2011. "Discovery" was the first of the three active space shuttles to be retired, completing its final mission on March 9, 2011; "Endeavour" did so on June 1. The final shuttle mission was completed with the landing of "Atlantis" on July 21, 2011, closing the 30-year Space Shuttle program. The Shuttle was presented to the public in 1972 as a "space truck" which would, among other things, be used to build a United States space station in low earth orbit in the early 1990s