Morehead State University - Raconteur Yearbook (Morehead, KY)

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1986: Year of PEACE? s if to signify how 1986, dubbed by the United Nations as the Year of Peace, was going, the U.N.'s symbol for the year, a Costa Rican cypress called the Tree of Peace, died. The sapling, which was transplanted from Costa Rica's Mountain of Death to a UN. garden, is said to have perished of botantical problems, not political. Even so, with fighting continuing in Afghanistan, Central America, lran and Iraq, and Southern Africa, some viewed the tree's August demise as a dark symbol of a year that got off to a bad start anyway. How will we remember 1986 ten years from now? Will we consider the space shuttle uChallenger exploding over the Atlantic, taking seven lives; or will we ponder the AIDS epidemic? Will we remember the day 0.8. military jets hit the Libyan terrorist machine, or will the hunger and political turmoil in Africa be on our minds? Perhaps we won't remember everything, good or bad, but it's safe to say that a few events of the year will stick in our memories. SPACE SHUTTLE uCHALLENGER : On January 28, 1986, HChallenger was launched after several days with the first civilian in space aboard, New Hampshire school teacher Christa McAuliffe, and six astronauts. Seventy-three seconds after Iift-off, hot exhaust gases burned through the seals on the right solid rocket booster and ignited the huge 154-foot external fuel tank.

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SPACE shuttle Challenger was launched on January 28. 1986 with the first civilian to be in space aboard. Seventy-three seconds after lift off. hot ex haust gas burned through the seals on the right solid rocket booster and ignited the 154-foot external fuel tank. PHOTOS BY JOHN FLAVELL

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1986: A Year of Peace? Preliminary speculation by NASA was that the seven crew members Iinever knew what happened. However, in July. NASA released a tape that recorded pilot Michael Smith's last words - Uh Oh. It was thought that the crew died instantly, but the recording of Smith's last words was made during the explosion. Also, four emergency air packs were used after the explosion - air packs that had to have been activated manually. Smithis air pack had to have been turned on by someone else, since it would have been impossible for him to have done it while he was strapped in. A presidential commission, headed by. former Secretary of State William Rogers, called the decision process by NASA to launch uChalIenger despite objections from the solid rocket booster builder Mor- ton Thiokol and shuttle builder Rockwell, flawed. The commission discovered that engineers at Thiokol had warned NASA about problems with the seals years ago, but NASA had allegedly ignored the warn- ings. It seemed that the unavoidable could have been avoided. CHERNOBYL: On April 28, 1986, technicians at a Swedish nuclear power plant discovered high levels of radiation around their plant. Fearing a leak, they searched frantically around the reactors for a source, but found none. Technicians in Norway and Denmark also detected high levels of radiation, but they too could not find the source in their own plants, or even in their own countries. Checking wind patterns from the Soviet Union, the Scandinavians discovered the radiation coming from the Chernobyl nuclear power plant near Kiev. Twelve hours after the first detection in Sweden, it had become clear that the worst nuclear accident had occurred at Cher- nobyl. The Soviets announced, as a result of world-wide pressure, that one of the reactors was on fire, release of radiation was uncontrolled, and the thousands of people living in surrounding areas had been evacuated. In the days following the accident, the Soviets realized that they needed help. British experts were called into consulta- tion because they had dealt with a similar situation at a similar reactor in 1957. A Soviet embassy official in Washington went before a Senate sub-committee to ex- plain the Soviet Unionis initial silence on the accident. And an American medical team went to Moscow to perform bone marrow transplants for affected people. The final results of the accident probably won't be clear for years. In the meantime, however, thousands of square miles of farm land surrounding the reactor are useless, generations of people are subject to cancer related diseases and the debate of the safety of nuclear power heats up. TERRORISM AND QADDAFI: Near the end of 1985 and the beginning of 1986, the western world witnessed the most violet activity terrorists could dish out. In the Mediterranean, terrorists hijacked the cruise ship HAchiIIe Lauro and killed American Leon Klinghoffer. A bomb smug- gled aboard a TWA flight exploded over Greece, killing three Americans who were sucked out of the aircraft. Gunmen opened fire in the Rome and Vienna airports during the busy holiday season. The dead include- an 11-year old American girl. In April, 0.8. President Ronald Reaga decided to back up his warning to ter rorists: iiYou can run, but you cant hide. Air Force fighter-bombers from Englan and carrier based air power stationed in th Mediterranean met for live minutes ove Libya and dropped over 60 tons of bomb on suspected terrorist buildings in Tripol' and Libyan military bases that posed threat. The United States lost one aircraf with two crewmen. The raid caught the Li byans and the rest of the world by com plete surprise. Although the Reagan Administratio i doubted the raid would cause Qaddafi to halt his support of terrorism, the months following the raid showed a quiet in Libya. It was suggested Qaddafi may have lost some of his power to the military's anger over the raid. NATURAL DISASTERS: The schoo year also saw its share of natural disasters An earthquake in Mexico all but levele- downtown Mexico City. In Colombia, th- Nevado del Ruiz errupted, killing as man at 25,000 people. A severe drought hit th southern United States. North Carolina wa particularly affected as crops and Iivestoc . died. Farmers from the midwest, and Ken tucky, sent thousands of bales of hay t- the south aboard donated trains.