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Launch Complex 39A (LC-39A) is the first of Launch Complex 39's three launch pads, located at NASA's Kennedy Space Center in Merritt Island, Florida.The pad, along with Launch Complex 39B, was first constructed in the 1960s to accommodate the Saturn V launch vehicle, and has been used to support NASA crewed space flight missions, including the historic Apollo 11 moon landing and the Space Shuttle.
Previous Kennedy Space Center (KSC) Master Plan recommendations—in 1966, 1972, and 1977—noted that an expansion of KSC's vertical launch capacity could occur when the market demand existed. The 2007 Site Evaluation Study recommended an additional vertical launch pad, Launch Complex 49 (LC-49), to be sited north of existing LC-39B.
On April 4, 1983, STS-6, the first mission of the orbiter Challenger, lifted off from Launch Complex 39A at the Kennedy Space Center at 18:30:00 UTC (1:30 pm EST, local time at the launch site). It marked the first use of a new lightweight external tank and lightweight Space Shuttle Solid Rocket Booster (SRB) casings, first use of the head-up ...
Non-launch costs account for a significant part of the program budget: for example, during fiscal years 2004 to 2006, NASA spent around $13 billion on the Space Shuttle program, [19] even though the fleet was grounded in the aftermath of the Columbia disaster and there were a total of three launches during this period of time. In fiscal year ...
STS-134 (ISS assembly flight ULF6) [9] was the penultimate mission of NASA's Space Shuttle program and the 25th and last spaceflight of Space Shuttle Endeavour. [10] This flight delivered the Alpha Magnetic Spectrometer and an ExPRESS Logistics Carrier to the International Space Station . [ 11 ]
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.
Astronauts Bob Behnken and Doug Hurley lifted off from Florida’s Kennedy Space Center at 3:22 p.m. ET on a test flight to the International Space Station. SpaceX and NASA usher in new era of ...
Space Shuttle Atlantis landing after STS-122, 2008. Columbia was the first Shuttle to arrive at the SLF via the Shuttle Carrier Aircraft on March 24, 1979. [10] The runway was first used to land a Space Shuttle on February 11, 1984, when Challenger's STS-41-B mission returned to Earth. This also marked the first landing of a spacecraft at its ...