The Space Shuttle Challenger. 1/ 28/ 1986.

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And the possible surviving of the crew capsule. The capsule didn't have parachutes to deploy. So it hit the water
at a high speed. Where were you that day when you heard about it.

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Shuttle Columbia, the last moments from the cockpit.

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There have been only three astronauts/ cosmonauts accually die in space in 50 years.The rest have been in launched or re- entry.

[Ranger99]

At work both times
The explosion in 86 was on
the television in the customer
waiting room and I happened to
be right there at the moment.
The last one I was upstairs in the
warehouse and a huge boom happened
and the whole building shook. There
were fenders and various sheet metal
body panels hanging from storage racks
that were swinging back and forth like
pendulums. It kind of shook the floor
under my feet. My first thought was
that somebody had run their vehicle
into the wall of the building. When I
got back downstairs, I walked out
into the main hallway and the service
manager was standing in the customer
lounge staring at the television and
had tears streaming down his face.
All he could say was that the shuttle
just blew up. It had went up nearly
directly overhead and was the
biggest boom I've ever heard.
There was bits and pieces scattered
all over east Texas and search parties
combed a bunch of thick thick woods
and creek bottoms looking for debris.
A good bit fell directly in some of the
small towns and into Louisiana.
I don't remember that anyone was
hurt by falling debris which was a
small miracle considering the
amount of it and the velocity

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This is why us and the Russians implemented Crew ejection rocket systems on future capsules. With parachutes. But we didn't have any American launches in ten years. Not until SpaceX. Gotta admit the
Falcon 9 rocket has shown itself as being very capable. But re-entry is still re-entry and only involves the capsule, or in this case the Spaceship. And when you have something happen like with Columbia,there isn't much that can be done at that point.

If the Shuttles wing had been damaged during launch, why wasn't the damage noticed while it was still in orbit?
Or when it was at the ISS. But the tile breech started out as small, and grew larger from there.

[Ranger99]

Yeah,  that's modern engineering.
Things generations back were built
to last forever and be serviceable
forever. Look at all the near ancient
buildings and structures and tools
and such still here and usable from
the last centuries that are still functional
or could still be put back in working
order. Most all modern things have
a definite shelf life. Structures are
designed just this side of failure.
All that said, it's a minor miracle
more space vehicles don't fall
apart regularly, much less return
the crew to earth safely

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Both disasters were from human error. And could have been avoided. Elon Musk and his starship is of concern.
He was even told by space agency's it was a bad design. If we ever really do head out to Mars.
A ship like that needs to be assembled in orbit over the years. Like the ISS was, sectional. The shuttles were a good space like pickup truck though.

[Argent 88]

In any kind of reality of a mission to Mars. It would have to be like this, which is beyond our current ability.
Notice it's modular in design. Just like the ISS.