At the same time, because of weight reductions and other improvements, the cargo the Shuttle can carry has increased by 7.3 metric tons (8 tons.) During the same period, the cost of operating the Shuttle has decreased by one and a quarter billion dollars annually-a reduction of more than 40 percent. Since 1992 alone, NASA has made engine and system improvements that are estimated to have tripled the safety of flying the Space Shuttle, and the number of problems experienced while a Space Shuttle is in flight has decreased by 70 percent. NASA has made literally thousands of major and minor modifications to the original design that have made it safer, more reliable and more capable today than ever before. Although it has been in operation for almost 20 years, the Shuttle has continually evolved and is significantly different today than when it first was launched. More than than 600 crew members have flown on its missions. Since 1981, it has boosted more than 1.36 million kilograms (3 million pounds) of cargo into orbit. The Shuttle has the most reliable launch record of any rocket now in operation. The Shuttle is designed to reach orbits ranging from about 185 kilometers to 643 kilometers (115 statute miles to 400 statute miles) high. Normally, crews may range in size from five to seven people. The smallest crew ever to fly on the Shuttle numbered two people on the first few missions. Normally, missions may be planned for anywhere from five to 16 days in duration. The longest the Shuttle has stayed in orbit on any single mission is 17.5 days on mission STS-80 in November 1996. The MSFC was also responsible for developing the Shuttle’s massive ET and the solid rocket motors and boosters. The MSFC was assigned responsibility for developing the Shuttle orbiter’s high-performance main engines, the most complex rocket engines ever built. Crucially involved with the Space Shuttle program virtually from its inception, the Marshall Space Flight Center (MSFC) played a leading role in the design, development, testing, and fabrication of many major Shuttle propulsion components. The SRB’s provide most of the power for the first two minutes of flight. The Shuttle’s major components are the orbiter spacecraft the three main engines, with a combined thrust of more than 1.2 million pounds the huge external tank (ET) that feeds the liquid hydrogen fuel and liquid oxygen oxidizer to the three main engines and the two solid rocket boosters (SRB’s), with their combined thrust of some 5.8 million pounds. Unlike earlier expendable rockets, the Shuttle was designed to be launched over and over again and would serve as a system for ferrying payloads and personnel to and from Earth orbit. The Space Shuttle represented an entirely new generation of space vehicle, the world’s first reusable spacecraft. All of the components are reused except for the external fuel tank, which burns up in the atmosphere after each launch. The Space Shuttle consists of three major components: the Orbiter which houses the crew a large External Tank that holds fuel for the main engines and two Solid Rocket Boosters which provide most of the Shuttle’s lift during the first two minutes of flight. An early Space Shuttle Orbiter, the Enterprise, never flew in space but was used for approach and landing tests at the Dryden Flight Research Center and several launch pad studies in the late 1970s. Endeavour was built as a replacement following the Challenger accident and was delivered to Florida in May 1991. Discovery was delivered in November 1983. The Orbiter Challenger was delivered to KSC in July 1982 and was destroyed in an explosion during ascent in January 1986. So far, altogether they have flown a combined total of less than one-fourth of that.Ĭolumbia was the first Space Shuttle orbiter to be delivered to NASA’s Kennedy Space Center, Fla., in March 1979. Columbia and the STS-107 crew were lost Feb. Each of the three Space Shuttle orbiters now in operation-Discovery, Atlantis and Endeavour-is designed to fly at least 100 missions. The Shuttle launches like a rocket, maneuvers in Earth orbit like a spacecraft and lands like an airplane. The Space Shuttle was the world’s first reusable spacecraft, and the first spacecraft in history that can carry large satellites both to and from orbit.
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