ormer NASA administrator James M. Beggs, who led the agency during the early years of the space shuttle program and resigned after the Challenger disaster killed seven astronauts in 1986, died Thursday at his home in Bethesda, Maryland. He was 94.
Congestive heart failure is suspected to be the cause of his death, according to one of his sons, Charles Beggs.
President Ronald Reagan nominated Beggs to become the sixth administrator of the National Aeronautics and Space Administration. He served in the agency’s top position from July 1981 to December 1985.
