Former Director of the Alabama NASA Center During the Challenger Space Shuttle Explosion Dies at 102

William Ray Lucas, who led the NASA facility that shouldered much of the blame for the 1986 explosion of the space shuttle Challenger, has died. Lucas was 102. Lucas died Monday at his home in Huntsville, Alabama, according to an obituary published Friday by Laughlin Service Funeral Home in Huntsville. A funeral service has been set for March 1 on what would have been his 103rd birthday, funeral director Bryan Peek said Saturday. Lucas was director of the Marshall Space Flight Center in Huntsville when the Challenger exploded on Jan. 28, 1986, just 73 seconds after liftoff from Cape Canaveral, Florida. It was the deadliest U.S. space flight disaster at that time....