Asteroid 3352 McAuliffe, an Amor asteroid, was discovered on February 6, 1981 at the Anderson Mesa unit of Lowell Observatory near Flagstaff, Arizona by Norman G. Thomas. He named it for Christa McAuliffe(1947-1986), a Concord, New Hampshire high-school teacher and astronaut who was one of the seven killed in the January 28, 1986 explosion of the space shuttle Challenger.
Christa McAuliffe
Ms. McAuliffe was a participant in President Ronald Reagan's Teacher In Space program and was supposed to teach a lesson in Earth orbit via satellite hookup to schoolchildren watching on TV screens in schools throughout America. Instead, these millions of students got to watch Ms. McAuliffe and her six crewmates die in living color in the most spectacular way imaginable.
The tragedy was blamed on a rubber O-ring joining one of the shuttle's two rocket boosters, which shrunk due to cold and allowed superheated gases to escape, burning a hole in the wall of the liquid fuel tank attached to the shuttle's underside and igniting the fuel it contained, slightly over one minute after liftoff from Cape Canaveral. After the Challenger accident, NASA, which is notoriously risk-averse when it comes to manned space flight, banned civilians from its shuttle flights, thereby all but forfeiting space tourism to the Russians, and placed the Teacher In Space program on hold for a very long time. It has only recently been reactivated.
One reason NASA prefers active military personnel over civilians in its astronaut corps is that this minimizes the chances of liability; military personnel and their survivors cannot sue for injury or death incurred in the line of duty. Christa McAuliffe knew the risks involved, as did her family, who have not filed suit against NASA. However, her death, more than any of the six other deaths that occurred that morning, was immensely traumatic. The Challenger tragedy destroyed an entire generation's faith in technology, nearly blew the Teacher In Space program out of the water and has almost totally sabotaged American-based civilian space flight for the foreseeable future.
Asteroid McAuliffe, therefore, signifies liability, unconscionable risk, associating with someone who brings trouble or ruin or is more difficult that (s)he is worth.
Ted Kennedy, whose political career has never fully recovered from the Chappaquiddick scandal, has McAuliffe in the fourth house, on the fifth cusp, trine Saturn(rules, consequences, career, work), binonile the Vertex(significant relationships), semisquare the Part of Fortune(success, life's unfolding), semisextile Asbolus(awful experiences, following instincts, failing to follow one's better judgment), sextile Pandora(making a splash, trouble through women), and sextile Harris(attacks from conservatives).
Gary Hart, whose political career was annihilated by his sexual indiscretions with Donna Rice and prevarication about the extramarital affair, has McAuliffe in the twelfth house, binonile the Moon(women, the public), biseptile the Sun(to shine), quadnonagon Mars(sex), binonile Jupiter(politics, philosophy), opposite Neptune(scandal, illusion), quintundecimal the Vertex(significant relationships), semisextile Damocles(drastic change, crisis, annihilation), decile Nessus(to covet, problems through sex), and parallel Ramirez(to have one's life invaded by evil).
Indira Gandhi, who ended up assassinated by her own Sikh bodyguards, has McAuliffe undecimal Mercury(the media, writings, speeches, thoughts), trine Mars(violence), biquintile Saturn, nonile Uranus(to break loose), semisextile Juno(the rage of the powerless, marriage), parallel Vertex, contraparallel Lilith(to accept outsiders, to resign oneself to something, repressed rage erupting), conjunct Heracles(to strive, to overcome), conjunct Hidalgo(to push one's own agenda), parallel Lacrimosa(to cry), conjunct Harris(murderous violence), trine Tara(smooth sailing), and parallel Simpson(to escape punishment).
J. Edgar Hoover, whose secret homosexuality made him a target for blackmail by La Cosa Nostra, which forced him to deny its existence and shield it from investigation, had McAuliffe in the first house, semisextile Mercury, biquintile Jupiter, square Saturn, parallel Vesta(commitment), biundecimal Pallas(politics, civilization's defense), quadraundecimal the South Node(the path of least resistance), parallel Pandora(to have an impact, upsets, unintended consequences), conjunct Lilith(to bite the bullet), quincunx Don Quixote(taking on the way things are), trine Chiron(self-wounding), sextile Asbolus(awful things), undecimal Pittsburghia(serious as a heart attack), and conjunct Sherlock(investigation).
Joan Crawford, whose sordid private life of child abuse, tyrannical behavior and orgies was ruthlessly exposed after her death by her oldest daughter Christina Crawford, had McAuliffe in the fifth house of children, septile Saturn, binonile Pluto(abuse of power), quintundecimal the North Node(to develop what one has), quintile the Black Moon9wildness, sterility), parallel Pallas, square Pandora(turbulence, feminism, trouble through women), and conjunct Fisher(to be "asking for it").
Jimmy Hoffa, who is believed to have been abducted and murdered by Mafia associates, whose relationship with him certainly harmed his reputation and career and that of the Teamsters Union he headed for many years, had McAuliffe in the twelfth house of secrets, conjunct the Ascendant(the physical body), vigintile Uranus(labor unions), semisquare Vesta, square Pholus(infiltration, paying the price for paying proper respect), and semisquare Ramirez(invasion by evil, murder).
The glyph for McAuliffe, my own invention, suggests the explosion of the Challenger, which created a cloud shaped remarkably like a scorpion.