Fifth classified DoD mission Deployment of Magnum. Sixth classified DoD mission Misty reconnaissance satellite deployment. Hubble Space Telescope deployment.
Compton Gamma Ray Observatory deployment. Tracking and data relay satellite deployment. Upper Atmosphere Research Satellite deployment. DSP satellite deployment. ATLAS-1 science platform. ATLAS-2 science platform. Spacelab -D2 Mission funded by Germany. Hubble Space Telescope servicing. First Shuttle- Mir docking. Template:Sfn [85]. Shuttle- Mir docking. Spacelab mission Truncated due to fuel cell problem. Last Shuttle- Mir docking.
ISS supply. Chandra X-ray Observatory deployed. Shuttle Radar Topography Mission. ISS assembly flight 3A: Z1 truss. ISS assembly flight 4A: P6 solar arrays, radiators. ISS assembly flight 5A: Destiny lab.
ISS supply and crew rotation. Hubble Space Telescope servicing Last successful mission for Columbia. ISS assembly flight 8A: S0 truss. ISS assembly flight 9A: S1 truss. ISS assembly flight 12A. ISS assembly flight 13A. STS Discovery. STS Atlantis. STS Endeavour. In , Apollo 17 carried the last batch of astronauts to the lunar surface.
But during that same year, NASA was already beginning the design and develop their next generation of crew-carrying craft. Nearly a decade later, the Space Shuttle was born. The Space Shuttle Program eventually flew missions, making it the core of American crewed spaceflight efforts for nearly four decades. More than 30 years later, when Space Shuttle Atlantis rolled to a stop on the runway July 21, , the shuttle program officially came to a close.
First conceived during the heady and well-funded time around the initial Moon landings, the Space Shuttle was intended to provide NASA with a low-cost means to bring humans and payloads to low-Earth orbit. All these potential benefits of the shuttle were piled on top of one key promise: rapid turnaround of the spacecraft between flights.
Some NASA personnel even anticipated that a shuttle would be able to carry out back-to-back flights within just a week or two. Many of the predictions for the Space Shuttle came true: the fleet helped build the ISS, docked with the Mir space station , made extensive use of Spacelab, and carried many important payloads to orbit — including the Hubble Space Telescope , the Chandra X-ray Observatory , and interplanetary probes Magellan , Ulysses , and Galileo , among others.
By any yardstick, NASA can be proud of these accomplishments. First — and perhaps most importantly — the program was wildly expensive. While the shuttle was proposed to make disposable rockets a thing of the past, it did exactly the opposite.
Most customers who wanted to put satellites into orbit found conventional rockets to be a cheaper alternative. Second, the proposed launch schedules and turnaround times for the shuttle fleet were essentially fantasy. The fastest turnaround for any shuttle in the history of the program was 54 days.
And after the Challenger disaster, the fastest turnaround was 88 days — a far cry from what NASA officials thought they could accomplish. Slower turnarounds meant fewer flights, which meant less access to space for paying customers, further driving business away from NASA. Safety was also an issue of paramount importance for the Space Shuttle Program. By the mids, much of the American public thought that spaceflight was routine.
NASA was even launching astronauts into space wearing just simple coveralls and helmets, having ditched the pressure suits used in the Mercury , Gemini , and Apollo programs. That includes the 13 days of the final shuttle flight, as well as the other 31, hours, 59 minutes and 33 seconds of all other missions. Some spaceflyers actually launched into orbit on Russian Soyuz vehicles and returned home on a shuttle.
That breaks down to men and 49 women hailing from 16 different countries. Of the missions, flights went as planned, with two ending in disaster. The shuttles that have launched into space are: Columbia, Challenger, Discovery, Atlantis and Endeavour. Challenger and Columbia were lost during spaceflight tragedies.
Another shuttle prototype, the Enterprise vehicle, only flew in Earth's atmosphere and never launched into orbit. Challenger broke apart 73 seconds after launch on Jan. Seven astronauts died in a horrific accident caused by a faulty seal on one of the shuttle's twin solid rocket boosters, which was aggravated by exceptionally cold weather.
An investigation later revealed that a piece of foam insulation from Columbia's fuel tank broke off during launch and impacted the orbiter's left wing. The shuttle's damaged heat shield failed to protect the vehicle as it reentered Earth's atmosphere, and Columbia broke apart as it flew over Texas. Both catastrophes brought NASA's space shuttle program to a temporary halt as operations and safety procedures were modified.
Yet, the accidents helped shape the agency's future, and the shuttle program would go on to persevere through the misfortunes. Discovery, the veteran of the fleet, is NASA's oldest and most traveled shuttle.
After 27 years and 39 flights, Discovery has logged days — a full year — in space, and journeyed ,, miles ,, km. Over its career, Discovery also made 5, orbits of the Earth.
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