From space to the Atlantic Ocean and back again, the incredible story of the soccer ball that survived the 1986 Challenger explosion

In 1986, NASA’s Challenger shuttle exploded 73 seconds after takeoff, killing all seven crew members. The shuttle created 14 tons of debris, which the US coast guard had to sift through to find the bodies of its occupants, and anything important that may have survived.

One of the unlikely survivors of the failed launch is a tattered soccer ball, covered in good luck messages from schoolchildren in Texas. 

Janelle Onizuka, the daughter of astronaut Ellison Onizuka, told ESPN she had given the ball to her father ahead of the Challenger launch.

The ball was no more than a practice ball, that had been signed by Janelle’s team with ‘Good Luck, Shuttle Crew’, scrawled in big blue writing on one side. 

Ellison slipped out to be presented the ball, and to say goodbye to his daughter.‘By virtue of the catastrophic days that followed, it is quite literally, my last fond memory of my dad face to face,’ Janelle told ABC last year.

The ball was found floating in the Atlantic Ocean after the crash. Following NASA’s investigation into what had happened and why, all personal items that were retrieved from the ocean were returned to the families of the crew members.