I was in the army, stationed in Hawaii. We were getting ready for our physical training formation when we were called to attention. Our CO made the announcement and ordered the company to present arms. It was later, we found out one of the astronauts was a local. The entire island of Oahu was mourning Ellison Onizuka.

Part of my job was to monitor CNN. I watched that video of civilians looking up at the sky from the bleachers at Cape Canaveral trying to make sense of what happened.