Source: Ronald Reagan’s Funeral Eulogy for the Challenger Crew
January 22, 1986. We remember.
January 28, actually. I remember that day well, too. I don’t know why I let it slip past me this year. All the damn networks talking about Heath Ledger, I guess.
And February 1 is this Friday. 5th anniversary of the Columbia disaster.
Nitpick: It was “Challenger, go at throttle-up”.
I always remember because it happened on my dad’s birthday and we were watching it live in school that day. I also remember that the class clown, Scott McGee cried. I was 8 years old and in Mrs. Browns 3rd grade class.
I hear “Challenger, go with throttle up” in this clip? 
The transcript apparently says “go at throttle up.” The dispute’s still raging over "with or “at”, it seems. Frankly, I heard “with” on your YouTube link as well, Zabali_Clawbane.
I saw this clip so many times in my youth… and I always heard “go with throttle up.”
Sounds like “at” to me.
And January 27, was the 41st anniversary of the Apollo 1 disaster, which is rarely acknowledged anymore.
* Virgil I. "Gus" Grissom, Command Pilot
* Edward H. White II, Senior Pilot
* Roger B. Chaffee, Pilot
They should not fly any more missions at the end of January or early February.
That entire speech could have ben boiled down to its best sentence (which would make a terrific epitaph for the seven astronauts, by the way):
Sailboat
Think about it though, at makes no grammatical sense, with does.
It does make grammatical sense.
Throttle up is a point in time. When you are at that point, the flight control makes a decision if you are still a go, or if you have to abort.
So you are go at throttle up. Meaning at this point in time, everything looks good.
Not to hijack the with-at debate, but here’s my recollection of that day:
I was the region editor for the Longmont, Colo., Times-Call then. During our morning news meeting, the Challenger launch had been relegated to the inside pages of the front section, despite Christa McAuliffe’s inclusion in the crew. Somebody made the remark that the only way a shuttle launch would make the front page any more was if it blew up on the launch pad. An hour later, the news editor’s computer terminal made the beeping sounds that had replaced AP’s old teletype bells, signaling an incoming bulletin. He jumped up from his desk and practically shouted at the city editor, “Shit, we gotta’ remake Page One – Challenger just blew up!” Everybody thought he was making a really bad joke. At that moment the sales manager literally ran into the newsroom and asked, “Is it true? Did it really blow up?”
Then we did a very strange thing. We wheeled a TV set in from the adjacent conference room and turned it on, and at that point I realized that a newspaper’s news staff was turning to television for confirmation of an event we’d been informed of by one of the most prestigious and credible news organizations in the world. We had an Associated Press bulletin flashing into our computer system, and we were turning to CNN – then still in its infancy – for confirmation.
That evening I sat with my oldest son (he was 10) and we watched coverage of the disaster aftermath. He was really excited about that mission because he felt a personal connection to the space program. Astronaut Vance Brand is from Longmont, and Jason had met him (of course, so had about 10,000 other school children). And Jason knew one of the elementary school teachers who had competed to participate in the teacher-space program. I’ll never forget my son sitting on my lap with tears streaming down his cheeks and asking, “What about her kids?” meaning Christa McAuliffe’s students.
Or, they are to “go with” the action of throttling up fully? 
I won’t forget seeing her parents, and the kids from her school, and just wanting to hug them and console them myself. I still cry if I see footage of that. 
I myself, was really looking forwards to a chance at seeing the science lesson from space, I couldn’t wait to find out the results of the experiments too. Seeing the engines snake through the air like that, still makes me sad, it echoes still. Especially since this state’s motto is Ad Astra Per Aspera, the words of the eulogy resonate with me. “Sometimes, when we reach for the stars, we fall short.” indeed.
There’s another, longer, Utube video that’s seems a bit clearer and includes the shuttle pilot responding to the “throttle up” command. It sounds like “with” to me. Here’s the second video: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Mr1TMyxArXk&feature=related
No but it works fine as a piece of jargon.
It sounds like “go-it”, I don’t hear a soft th sound but it’s not very clear.
Ok, this made me cry!
I watched one of the other YouTube videos, which shows a lot of the crowd watching… at first everyone cheered, thinking the explosion was supposed to happen, and then… something just clicked that it wasn’t right. It was horrifying to see the realisation on people’s faces, as it just dawned on them that the most exciting day of their lives has just become one of the worst imaginable!
Frankly, I’m impressed at how calm the announcer was, relaying the details. It seems you should have been able to hear his voice crack too, though at the end, there was a bit more of a strain to it, I think.
FWIW, I hear “go with throttle up” - I’m not a pilot, but it sounds like a pilot-like phrase to me! “Go with flaps 20%” “Go with throttle up”. I dunno.