![]() ![]() Interplanetary probes such as the Galileo mission to Jupiter have been transported to space by the shuttle before launching themselves on interplanetary trajectories with their own rocket systems. Lacking a space station to which to travel until 1998, when construction of the International Space Station began, the shuttles have for most of their history operated with two major goals: (1) the conduct of scientific experiments in a microgravity environment and (2) the release, capture, repair, and re-release of scientific, commercial, and military satellites. The United States shuttle system -which includes the shuttle vehicle itself, launch boosters, and other components -is officially termed the Space Transportation System (STS). ![]() experiment with Skylab (1973 –1979) were the only exceptions to this pattern that is, until the current development of the International Space Station, which is an international effort that includes the U.S. The brief Soviet excursion into shuttle design(Buran)andtheU.S. The former Soviet Union built, and for many years operated, space stations ( Salyut, 1971 –1991, and Mir, 1986 –2001), while Americans have focused their attention on the space shuttle. Because of the high cost of space flight, however, each nation eventually ended up concentrating on only one aspect of this program. Mission of the space shuttleĪt one time, both the United States and the Soviet Union envisioned complex space programs that included space stations orbiting the Earth and reusable shuttle spacecraft to transport people, equipment, raw materials, and finished products to and from these space stations. Buran ’s computer-piloted first flight was also its last the program was cut to save money and all copies of the craft that had been built were dismantled. The first shuttle actually built, the Enterprise, was flown in the atmosphere but was never equipped for space flight it is now in the collection of the Smithsonian Museum.Ī spacecraft closely resembling the United States space shuttle, the Aero-Buran, was launched by the former Soviet Union in November 1988. The three remaining shuttles are the Atlantis, the Discovery, and the Endeavor. Seven crew members died in each accident. Since that time, two shuttles have been lost in flight: Challenger, which exploded during takeoff on January 28, 1986,Īnd Columbia, which broke apart during reentry on February 1, 2003. The first shuttle to be launched into orbit about Earth was the Columbia, on April 12, 1981. It is not capable of flight to the moon or other planets, being designed only to orbit Earth. The space shuttle has been essential to the repair and maintenance of the Hubble Space Telescope and to the construction of the International Space Station it has also been used for a wide variety of other military, scientific, and commercial missions. The space shuttle fleet is a number of reusable spacecraft that take off like a rocket, orbit Earth like a satellite, and then land like a glider. Military shuttle missions and the military space plane ![]()
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