NASA's Space Shuttle program was one of the greatest achievements of the Space Age. From 1981 to 2011, the Space Shuttles, Columbia, Discovery, Challenger, Endeavor, and Atlantis, flew astronauts to and from Space on various missions.
The history of the Space Shuttle goes all the way back to the Mercury Program, from 1962-1963. Mercury launched six people into Space, and laid the foundation for people to eventually live in Space.
After Mercury comes Gemini, 1965-1966. There were ten launches with the Gemini Program, and the basis here was for people to learn to work in Space.
After the Gemini Program came the famous Apollo Program, 1969-1972. The purpose of the Apollo Program was to explore Space. It was with Apollo that America made the historic milestone of landing a human on the moon, with the Apollo 11 spacecraft in 1969.
After Apollo, NASA wanted humans to go to Mars. To do this, we needed to build a moon base first, and for the moon base, we needed a low Earth orbiting space station. This leads us to the Space Shuttle. In 1972, Congress approved the budget for the Space Shuttle Program. When the Apollo 16 astronauts were informed of this approval, while still on the moon, they jumped up three feet in excitement!
Now that the funding was secured, NASA turned to Max Faget for assistance in designing the Shuttle. Max Faget designed both the Mercury and Gemini spacecraft, and assisted in the design of the Apollo spacecraft, so he was a logical choice for the design of the Space Shuttle. His early designs were conical, like the Apollo, with extra boosters and engines for returning to Earth. The design that NASA wanted to use had a plane like structure, much like today's Space Shuttle, but what was unique about it was the booster rockets. The rockets were also designed like a plane, with wings, a cockpit and jet engines; this was so that a pilot could sit in the cockpit and fly the rockets back to Kennedy Space Center for reuse. NASA was all set to go with this design, but than the early plans showed that the approximate weight at launch would be 4,600,000 lbs! So they redesigned the rockets to be expendable, and fall off at a certain point to decrease the launch weight.
Once they had this part of the plans down, NASA turned to Boeing, Grummen and Thiokel to design the actual shuttle part. The main specification was that the payload had to be 60 ft. long and 15 ft. wide to allow for military cargo.
Grummen opted to put extra rockets on the Shuttle and launch that as it was.
Boeing came up with putting wings and a cockpit on the Saturn 5 rocket, and their design was closest to what we have today.
Thiokel decided to put rocket boosters along the sides and under the main shuttle.
NASA eventually decided to use the Saturn 5 rocket, with boosters along the sides of the Shuttle.
Now they needed fuel. There are two types of rocket fuel, solid and liquid. The benefits to solid rocket fuel are that it is cheaper, easier to use, and less complex than liquid fuel. But liquid fuel, although more expensive, harder to use because it needs better containers, and more complex, is actually safer. This is because, while liquid fuel can be shut off in the case of an emergency, solid fuel can not.
So NASA's final design was the Shuttle, with an external fuel tank below, and boosters along the sides, just like we have today. :)
Enterprise was the first Space Shuttle. Originally called 'Constellation'; so many Trekkies wrote to NASA that they finally gave in and named it 'Enterprise'. Enterprise was designed to go into Space, but all it was ever used for was testing launch and landing sites.
Next came Columbia. Columbia was the first Space Shuttle to launch all the way into space and come back down in 1981. It exploded during a launch in 2003.
Challenger made very few flights before it exploded in the atmosphere after launch in 1989.
Discovery made more flights than any other shuttle. It launched the Hubble Space Telescope in 1991, and was the 'Back to Orbit' vehicle after both the Challenger and Columbia Tragedies.
Endeavor made more flights than any other shuttle except Discovery, and still has one more flight to go before retirement.
Atlantis will be the last shuttle to be launched in Summer 2011.
And Discovery, Atlantis and Endeavor all helped to build the International Space Station, the first permanent space station and first step towards the moon base and Mars.
The Space Shuttle was originally to be replaced by the Constellation Program, but sadly, Congress cut funding for it. However, NASA will continue flying to the Space Station using the new Orion spacecraft, and hopes to build a permanent moon base using Orion.
Next Focus: Rocketry 101
The history of the Space Shuttle goes all the way back to the Mercury Program, from 1962-1963. Mercury launched six people into Space, and laid the foundation for people to eventually live in Space.
After Mercury comes Gemini, 1965-1966. There were ten launches with the Gemini Program, and the basis here was for people to learn to work in Space.
After the Gemini Program came the famous Apollo Program, 1969-1972. The purpose of the Apollo Program was to explore Space. It was with Apollo that America made the historic milestone of landing a human on the moon, with the Apollo 11 spacecraft in 1969.
After Apollo, NASA wanted humans to go to Mars. To do this, we needed to build a moon base first, and for the moon base, we needed a low Earth orbiting space station. This leads us to the Space Shuttle. In 1972, Congress approved the budget for the Space Shuttle Program. When the Apollo 16 astronauts were informed of this approval, while still on the moon, they jumped up three feet in excitement!
Now that the funding was secured, NASA turned to Max Faget for assistance in designing the Shuttle. Max Faget designed both the Mercury and Gemini spacecraft, and assisted in the design of the Apollo spacecraft, so he was a logical choice for the design of the Space Shuttle. His early designs were conical, like the Apollo, with extra boosters and engines for returning to Earth. The design that NASA wanted to use had a plane like structure, much like today's Space Shuttle, but what was unique about it was the booster rockets. The rockets were also designed like a plane, with wings, a cockpit and jet engines; this was so that a pilot could sit in the cockpit and fly the rockets back to Kennedy Space Center for reuse. NASA was all set to go with this design, but than the early plans showed that the approximate weight at launch would be 4,600,000 lbs! So they redesigned the rockets to be expendable, and fall off at a certain point to decrease the launch weight.
Once they had this part of the plans down, NASA turned to Boeing, Grummen and Thiokel to design the actual shuttle part. The main specification was that the payload had to be 60 ft. long and 15 ft. wide to allow for military cargo.
Grummen opted to put extra rockets on the Shuttle and launch that as it was.
Boeing came up with putting wings and a cockpit on the Saturn 5 rocket, and their design was closest to what we have today.
Thiokel decided to put rocket boosters along the sides and under the main shuttle.
NASA eventually decided to use the Saturn 5 rocket, with boosters along the sides of the Shuttle.
Now they needed fuel. There are two types of rocket fuel, solid and liquid. The benefits to solid rocket fuel are that it is cheaper, easier to use, and less complex than liquid fuel. But liquid fuel, although more expensive, harder to use because it needs better containers, and more complex, is actually safer. This is because, while liquid fuel can be shut off in the case of an emergency, solid fuel can not.
So NASA's final design was the Shuttle, with an external fuel tank below, and boosters along the sides, just like we have today. :)
Enterprise was the first Space Shuttle. Originally called 'Constellation'; so many Trekkies wrote to NASA that they finally gave in and named it 'Enterprise'. Enterprise was designed to go into Space, but all it was ever used for was testing launch and landing sites.
Next came Columbia. Columbia was the first Space Shuttle to launch all the way into space and come back down in 1981. It exploded during a launch in 2003.
Challenger made very few flights before it exploded in the atmosphere after launch in 1989.
Discovery made more flights than any other shuttle. It launched the Hubble Space Telescope in 1991, and was the 'Back to Orbit' vehicle after both the Challenger and Columbia Tragedies.
Endeavor made more flights than any other shuttle except Discovery, and still has one more flight to go before retirement.
Atlantis will be the last shuttle to be launched in Summer 2011.
And Discovery, Atlantis and Endeavor all helped to build the International Space Station, the first permanent space station and first step towards the moon base and Mars.
The Space Shuttle was originally to be replaced by the Constellation Program, but sadly, Congress cut funding for it. However, NASA will continue flying to the Space Station using the new Orion spacecraft, and hopes to build a permanent moon base using Orion.
Next Focus: Rocketry 101
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