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The longest orbital flight of the Shuttle was STS-80 at 17 days 15 hours, while the shortest flight was STS-51-L at one minute 13 seconds when the Space Shuttle Challenger broke apart during launch. The cold morning shrunk an O-Ring on the right Solid Rocket Booster causing the external fuel tank to explode.
The Space Shuttle (and prior program) flight controllers worked relatively brief periods: The several minutes of ascent, the few days the vehicle was in orbit, and reentry. The duration of operations for Space Shuttle flight controllers was short and time-critical.
Columbia (STS-3) landing on Northrop Strip at White Sands Space Harbor, 30 March 1982, flanked by two T-38 chase planes. White Sands Space Harbor at White Sands Test Facility in New Mexico was an emergency landing site for the Space Shuttle and was used as a backup when the runways at Edwards Air Force Base and the Kennedy Space Center were ...
The stalled plans for a U.S. space station evolved into the International Space Station and were formally initiated in 1983 by President Ronald Reagan, but the ISS suffered from long delays, design changes and cost over-runs [3] and forced the service life of the Space Shuttle to be extended several times until 2011 when it was finally retired ...
Nuclear Ferry and Shuttle Orbiter docked to an Orbital Propellant Depot. The Space Transportation System (STS), also known internally to NASA as the Integrated Program Plan (IPP), [1] was a proposed system of reusable crewed space vehicles envisioned in 1969 to support extended operations beyond the Apollo program (NASA appropriated the name for its Space Shuttle Program, the only component of ...
The 45 WS provided data and decision criteria when a Shuttle was ferried back to KSC from Edwards Air Force Base, California. This is where the Orbiter was mated on top of a modified Boeing 747, known as the Shuttle Carrier Aircraft, for the return flight to KSC. Edwards AFB desert landing runway was the primary backup site for returning ...
STS-96 was a Space Shuttle mission to the International Space Station (ISS) flown by Space Shuttle Discovery, and the first shuttle flight to dock at the International Space Station. It was Discovery's 26th flight. [1] [2] The shuttle carried the Spacehab module in the payload, filled with cargo for station outfitting. STS-96 launched from ...
STS-121 was a 2006 Space Shuttle mission to the International Space Station (ISS) flown by Space Shuttle Discovery on its 32nd flight. The main purposes of the mission were to test new safety and repair techniques introduced following the Columbia disaster of February 2003 as well as to deliver supplies, equipment and German European Space ...