The history of football, had been in space

• The history of football, had been in space

In 1986, the shuttle Challenger exploded 73 seconds into the flight, thereby interrupting the lives of seven NASA team members. The ship broke into 14 tons of debris, which are able to detect - they are scattered on the water surface of the ocean, and a special search team was forced to seek among them the remains of the bodies of the crew. One of the findings of this team has been battered football match - all in the inscriptions of students from Texas. Children want the astronauts good luck.

Janelle Onizuka, the daughter of one of the astronauts (Eliasson Onizuka), later told reporters that handed the ball to his father on the eve of departure. Her father was then quarantined mandatory for all astronauts on the eve of departure, but he still managed to see his daughter - and it was then that she gave him a gift. And that was the last time she saw her father alive. The father did not return home, and the ball came back.

Eliason Onizuka.

After investigating the disaster NASA returned the families of the victims all their personal belongings, which they could find. So Janelle and her mother, Lorna got the ball. They did not want to make him a commemorative artifact or thing that is stored in a prominent place, and gave it to the school, where the ball is placed on the shelf, signed, and where he lay, pylyas several decades.

Janelle Onizuka, gave his father the ball on the eve of the tragic flight.

30 years after this tragedy, one of the parents of pupils at the school, drew attention to the ball, exposed for all to see. The man saw the barely visible inscription on the side of the ball and realized that this is the soccer ball that flew into space, but returned to the ground in such tragic circumstances. The current director of the institution was not aware of the history of this trophy and was genuinely surprised by this turn of events.

And one had to happen - just a few years later, in October 2016 the school turned from NASA to offer something like that to send astronauts to the upcoming flight Expedition 49, in which astronaut Robert Shane Kimbrough had to spend in space 173 days . The director immediately thought of an unusual ball, stored in her school.

Robert S. Kimbrough.

When the astronaut was awarded a commemorative ball, he was struck. "I must confess, overwhelmed with emotion only by the thought that I hold such an object. With all this history behind this ball - just think how much has happened to him before he came here, "- said at the time, Robert Kimbrough. - "I think about a family of astronauts, about what it meant for them the ball. I even took a picture of it and sent these photos to them. "

In the end, the ball went into space again. This time, despite the possible bias, nothing happened to the crew. The ball flew with astronaut on the International Space Station and back again after school. Now put the ball back to the place where it was stored before, now just do not forget to sign such an important exhibit. On a plate lying on the ball, marked the milestone of "life" of the trophy: "Space Shuttle Challenger, January 28, 1986 - The International Space Station, October 19, 2016 - School of Clear Lake, November 3, 2017."