Queen Bey Gets Flack For Challenger Sound Footage!

Beyonce can't catch a break from those critical of her and her husband media mogul Jay-Z.


What I'm hearing is the controversial video that Beyonce participated in included the 1986 NASA tragedy of Spaceship Challenger. The first six second of a video drove the racist right nuts!

The video XO is released on the internet and some are calling it trash because she used stock footage of a major tragedy. Again ignoring the artistic creativity of the pop singer, just solely focusing on the tragedy.

Beyonce was probably five years old when it happen. I was six years old when it happened. I remember I was in the classroom when students from coast to coast saw the space shuttle Challenger blow up within a few minutes in the air. It killed Christa McAuliffe, a high school teacher who became an astronaut. She won a contest to be the first teacher in space.

Former NASA employees and NASA families have slammed Beyonce for sampling audio from the space shuttle Challenger explosion on her new song "XO."

"Flight controllers here looking very carefully at the situation. Obviously a major malfunction," former NASA public affairs officer Steve Nesbitt can be heard saying in the first six seconds of "XO." The communication is from a broadcast of the Mission Control Center in Houston after the Challenger exploded following takeoff on Jan. 28, 1986. The tragedy left all seven crew members dead.

NASA officials, under the condition of anonymity, expressed dismay to ABC News over Beyonce's choice of sampling. June Scobee Rodgers, the widow of Challenger Space Shuttle Commander Dick Scobee, told ABC she's "disappointed" and described the clip included in the song as "an emotionally difficult one."

Former NASA employee Keith Cowing and the man behind NASAwatch.com wants Beyonce to remove the NASA audio altogether. He called it "inappropriate in the extreme" and compared it to using soundbites from Sept. 11 or the assassination of President John F. Kennedy.

"Having this audio included in such a song serves to mock the severity of the events and loss that these final words represent," he wrote on his website. "If this was done with full knowledge of the origin of these words then this is simply repugnant. If this was done without due diligence as to the source of the words being sampled, then this is ignorance. Either way Beyoncé owes the families of the crew of Challenger an apology."

Beyonce responded in a statement to ABC:

My heart goes out to the families of those lost in the Challenger disaster. The song 'XO' was recorded with the sincerest intention to help heal those who have lost loved ones and to remind us that unexpected things happen, so love and appreciate every minute that you have with those who mean the most to you. The songwriters included the audio in tribute to the unselfish work of the Challenger crew with hope that they will never be forgotten.

Horrible tragedy.

"XO" is about a troubled relationship, The Hollywood Reporter noted.


Beyonce's rep could not be reached for further comment.

I agree that it was a horrible tragedy. But for the racist right, she can't do that! Only people like Phil Robertson can because he's White and he's a Christian.

The racist right would rather see Beyonce back in the kitchen. That's what Rush Limbaugh (aka King Hippo) thought of her this year.