an idea born in unsettled are going
forward I'm at the United States his
first space becomes a feat of
engineering excellence the most complex
machine ever built
to bring humans to and from space by
Harold and Gary and eventually construct
the next stop on the road to space
exploration we are on a true spaceship
as thirty years of flight draw to a
close its legacy is one of unsurpassed
achieved tragedy of accompany
opportunity
NASA's Space Shuttle
Space Shuttle Endeavor is rolling out to
launch pad 39a at NASA's Kennedy Space
Center in Florida in 24 missions flown
over 20 years endeavour has logged more
than 103 million miles in space
the last of NASA shuttles to be built
endeavour prepares for her final flight
STS 134 I marvel at when I when I see
the space shell up close and personal
behind the panels where we have Hardware
plumbing black boxes electronic devices
and that sort of thing the workmanship
that I see in this is astounding and
that points right at the people that do
this when you integrate all that
together it results in and what I think
has been a marvelous program with the
spaceship well before any shuttle
reaches the launch pad however a
staggering amount of work is required
the parts plans and people necessary to
make each launch span the entire nation
one single goal is the focus the safety
of the orbiter and recruiting you've got
all these people all these folks that
are in their 20s some of them in their
30s and they are no kidding in charge
some part of the Space Shuttle some part
of the space station or some part of the
plan and every one of those people
absolutely believe that they are the one
that makes the difference on getting
those astronauts back down to the ground
at NASA's Michoud assembly facility in
New Orleans production begins on the
shuttles external fuel tank the last of
136 produced here since 1973 each one
154 feet tall and 20 7.6 feet around is
capable of handling five hundred and
thirty-five thousand gallons of liquid
hydrogen and oxygen enough to fill 13375
average household that's three versions
of the external tank were created during
the program in an effort to reduce the
tanks overall weight and allow for
heavier shuttle payloads
around the same time in Clearfield Utah
technicians at ATK launch systems start
work on the shuttle system solid rocket
motors or booster fire
together these SRBs produced nearly 6
million pounds of thrust about 80
percent of the thrust needed to push the
orbiter in space the remaining 17% is
furnished by the shuttles three main
engines fueled by the external tank
unlike the orange external tank that is
used only once the Boosters detach
themselves and parachute into the
Atlantic Ocean
they are then retrieved refurbished and
reused on later missions
the shuttle missions cruise aside folks
on there that are like my brothers and
sisters I mean we really do get close
after a year training for a flight and
having flown in space together there's a
special bond that comes with that right
up until lunch a shuttle crew will train
in the variety of critical regimens some
basic others specific to their mission
simulations
safety and contingency science
experiments and underwater in the
world's largest indoor pool sts-134
astronauts floating in actual spaces
trained to work during extra vehicular
activities or EDA s the neutral buoyancy
lab or NBL at NASA's Johnson Space
Center Houston is the best simulation of
microgravity on earth an ideal for
practicing spacewalks
one of the most amazing facilities that
we work in is the NBL the neutral
buoyancy lab and the divers and the guys
who run helped us run the robotic arm
are all there to ensure that our
spacewalks are flawless their efforts in
that pool have helped us and made us
able to have this program every step of
a slog every step of EPA is so critical
and even though we see it every day
that's what that one little spaces are
there could be life or death for every
hour that they spend in orbit they'll
spend five to six hours training for
that same task so we've built up from
the suit engineers and suit technicians
who helped them get into the suit now
we've got trainers who help them learn
how to use the suit and learn how to
understand the suit and then we've got
divers who support them whether in the
pool the closer they get to actually
flying in the suit the team of people
who help them tends to grow maybe not
exponentially but it's certainly getting
bigger
a 12-person crews kept a week-long vigil
while the large carrying with ET made
the 900 miles direct from Louisiana to
Florida's Central East Coast the iconic
Orange external tank finally arrives at
the Kennedy Space Center
one month later the e-team is mated to
the solid rocket boosters to form the
backbone for the stack now all that's
missing is the spacecraft itself when an
orbiter returns from a mission
processing for the next flight begins
almost immediately it's a task requiring
no less than 650,000 hours late this
includes the removal of its free liquid
fuel engines and their replacement by
three from a previously
they've been refurbished inspected and
tested at the Stennis Space Center
but most of its flight preparations
complete endeavour is towed in what is
called the roll over a short roll over a
quarter mile distance on a thirty six
wheeled vehicle from the orbiter
processing facility the OPF to the VA be
here if undergoes its flight
configuration
the rollout looking now much like it
will at liftoff the space shuttle is
carried to the launch pad atop the six
million pound crawler transporter at a
blazing pace of less than a mile amount
not exactly warp speed
how this engineering marvel came to be
as an amazing story begins in the early
1970s Vietnam War is device becomes the
economy is sliding into recession and
with the race to the moon already won
the Apollo program is canceled a new
mission is sought for NASA to send
humans into space but Mars for many the
next logical step on the path of
exploration is dismissed as too costly a
destination for a country preoccupied
with events back on earth instead on
January 5th 1972 another destination is
selected low-earth orbit as early as the
mid 1960s NASA had concluded that the
technology was available to build and
fly a reusable spacecraft President
Nixon really liked the idea and and told
the NASA Administrator go do it and the
NASA Administrator got a call from OMB
the next morning someone there and said
hey but the president really meant to
say was you're going to get this much
money and so do as best you can with the
space transportation system and our
choice logically was we have to have a
vehicle first and so that that was the
birth of the Space Shuttle as the first
in the three-part space transportation
system many designs were considered
often they combined the best features of
different concepts at that time they
were looking at having jet engines on a
shuttle for landing and for transporting
it across country the idea of the
lifting body was to bring astronauts
home through conventional runway land
previously all of our steaks have which
were capital and down in the ocean
someone came up the idea of a vehicle
that could land like an airplane the key
thing was to understand aerodynamic
stability across the hypersonic
supersonic subsonic and landing speed
type of environment that a single
vehicle has to fly safely that was the
key thing that was learned from those
and you'll see it reflected in the shape
of the space shuttle one was the use of
a lifting body an aircraft with no
conventional wings only its fuselage
would keep the aircraft airborne and
guided safely back to earth they were
known as flying bathtub for the first
step the m2 f1 was towed behind a car
souped-up potty act whitey Whiteside
drove that Pontiac crossed like that
about 120 miles per hour dragging us
flies out behind it as well as
groundbreaking there tests could also
prove ground shaking
the x24 be a lifting body with wings was
the first such crab to land on an actual
run as all shuttles would have ventured
into early on the space shuttle was
going to have jet engines to return for
horizontal landing much like an airliner
the x-15 had proven fairly specifically
that they can make horizontal landings
very accurately unpowered flying speed
black smoke that they could do a
horizontal unpowered landing with the
shuttle as they tried to narrow its size
shape and weight Engineers also
considered how this new orbiter would be
propelled safely out of the reach of
Earth's gravity at the Marshall Space
Flight Center in Huntsville the Rockets
that had sent every Mercury Gemini and
Apollo astronaut into space
all engine run what god we have a left
our design teams would devise the
partially reusable propulsion system
that would finally be about
main engines were always something we
paid very close attention to lots of
moving parts lots of lots of high energy
and very tight places and very cold
liquid on one side of a very small wall
and very hot on the other side
and that thing finally bit off for me it
just showed the power of a space shuttle
main engine and then there's three on
the back of an orbiter and then there's
the two solid rocket motors that was
probably the spark that that got me so
interested in the special programming
zone on and what it took to actually get
one engine D'Lite that's less three and
two boosters to take the shuttle to
orbit as for the orbiter spiraling costs
forced NASA to abandon equipping it with
his own jet engines and escape pod
originally it was going to be an
air-breathing airplane that would fly to
space as a rocket and then come back to
earth the orbital maneuvering system
pods that sit on the back now we're to
be where deployable air breathing
engines would come out and it would
be--look fly from its intended point of
landing to another place if the weather
were bad or something like that NASA's
new shuttle would essentially glide its
way back to it producing the components
of this new space transportation system
Felton familiar names in the space
industry prime contractor Rockwell North
American now Boeing had built the Apollo
command/service module Morton Thiokol
now ATK would build the solid rocket
boosters and Martin Marietta
now Lockheed Martin would construct the
et responsibility for producing the
space shuttles main engines went to
Rocketdyne now Pratt Whitney there's a
lot of team with who has gone on it was
bringing people from all across the
country from Kennedy from Johnson from
Marshall so many people involved that
had to work together now at the
beginning there was a lot of anxiety
that we weren't going to work together
but when people got to know each other
and could trust each other that's when
the work became it was an amazing
vehicle and a lot of ways way ahead of
its time to have a reusable spacecraft
they could carry such tremendous amounts
of cargo
to space was unprecedented September
1976 more than four-and-a-half years
after President Nixon signed off on its
development America's new spacecraft
Constitution gets his first close up
before the cameras the orbiter itself is
well received by the public but
impassioned fans of a particular long
cancelled television series called Star
Trek wanted it called something else
they staged a successful write-in
campaign and the orbiter was renamed for
the starship featured on the show
thus NASA's new shuttle would be the
interprets boldly going as no spacecraft
had ever gone before
whatever its name this bird still needed
to prove he could fly
in an age before computer simulations
balsa wood models and Windtunnel testing
was the only means to test the airliners
I'd glider we put together a very
aggressive flight test profile that
consisted of data points continuously
all the way down there were just not
there was not a matter of ten seconds
went by without another either pitch
doublet or a rudder kick or an angle of
attack sweep the things that really turn
on a test pilot to fly them as
accurately as possible
August 12 1977 on the crystal-clear
California morning high above the Mojave
Desert to NASA test pilots ready for
enterprises first flight the plan was
for Fred Hayes jr. and Gordon Fullerton
to lift the orbiter off a modified 747
then land on a dry lakebed
15,000 feet below the thing that we were
most concerned about was if we were
going to be able to get to a launch
speed Fitz Fulton was going to be able
to put the 747 into a slight dive so
that we would have enough lift on the
enterprise to when we did push the
separation but inaudible to lift away
from the airplane without getting Fitz's
tail and of course both of us were
interested in that happening the pilots
on the 747 jets Fulton and Tom mcmerkin
sit and wait for the command to release
and steer their massive aircraft out
from under Enterprise they were still
questioned about was it going to
actually happen as we expected from
those simulations and the analysis and
everything there's a very loud bump when
the shuttle separates it was always
question was still don't slide back his
tail is them 470 but we couldn't see
that but we
after a few seconds we could tell it
didn't hit us and so the chase call
clear once we reached the 240 knots and
it's called on speed I think he really
pushed some of the sensors he was
looking at in order to let us get to
there but and we appreciated it but once
once we heard fish say on speed
I pushed the separation button and we we
just broke free we had about one and a
half G's of lift honestly that would
probably the most exciting moment in the
approach and landing test to feel and be
there blend the shuttle separated from
the festival cover by all accounts this
first free fall test is a success
five weeks later Enterprise is brought
to twenty two thousand for her second
freefall test pilots Joe Engel and dick
truly have only two minutes to capture
flight and maneuvering data before
landing the aircraft again without in
the end it was a real team effort the
challenge was for Victor Lee and I to
fly that profile and fly those data
points those maneuvers as precisely as
possible to give them to the state of
possible it was it was a test pilots
train a total of 16 taxi captive and
drop tests confirm the sounds of the
crafts design and green-lighted
production of the first space
whirly-hook
Columbia NASA's first orbit is fittingly
named after the first American vessel to
circumnavigate the however Columbia
quickly becomes a daunting challenge
witness it's complex maker at engineer
struggling constantly to reduce
Columbia's weight and simplify
construction especially frustrating was
keeping the orbiters ceramic tiles
attached to its few George more than
25,000 fit together to protect Columbia
from the searing 3,000 degrees of the
entry we were having a lot of problems
with the thermal protection system of
the tiles the way we were trying to
Google momentum wouldn't stay off and we
had to come up with a way of making sure
that they'd stay on and we had some
really great people that work that and
that's why it took such a long time I
had hoped it was not going to take that
long since well John and I were named as
a crew
so we had a lot more time to Train than
what I expected we both did initially
planned the requirement was to be able
to handle temperatures like 2500 degrees
after her on the surface of the the TPS
and that's five times what your oven is
a home that you bake cookies under at
max
the other problem is weight because
after all this is an airplane so you
can't have a metallic system on it that
weighs tons it has to be extremely
lightweight
in fact the shuttle tiles are about 90%
air and that gives the combination of
being able to be temperature resistant
at at the same time light each orbiter
has a unique number of protective tiles
challenges was built with the most
thirty one thousand and eighty eight
while Atlantis has the fewest a mere
twenty four thousand one hundred and
seventy seven Elvin Palmdale they had
put on their first effort of putting the
tiles on to protect the aluminum from
the heating then we're going to get on
reentry and some of those tiles would
they put them on in the daytime next
morning the tiles were on the hangar
floor and so that was real scary that
they we can lose some tiles whether
they're on orbit and really have a
problem with the heat coming back on
reentry to Columbia had a lot of tiles
missing yet needed quite a bit of work
before we could deliver it to the Cape
and we scrounged throughout the city of
Lancaster for rkv which was the sea
material we use to glue the tiles on
with more glue did keep the tiles in
place however water was literally
ripping them apart it turns out an
instant we hit rain the tiles were
almost exploded the tiles fabrication
process was modified and the problem
overcome other shuttle design features
proved less problematic and more
groundbreaking a computerized digital
flight control system now common in
commercial and military air was
developed for the orbiter in flying the
Space Shuttle you were so aware that you
aren't necessarily talking to the
shuttle you're talking to a computer who
in turn was going to talk to the to the
shuttle barriers of race and gender were
falling everywhere and America's core of
shuttle astronauts would become more
reflective of the nation it served
there's been a lot that the shuttle era
has done to bring a spaceflight into
into the domain of the average person we
know it's not just crew-cut white test
pilots anymore it's the essentially the
United Nations that flies on the space
shuttle that's people of every
description that looked very much like
the rest of us the astronaut selection
process reflected a changing nation and
a changing NASA at time we got a lot of
criticism that maybe the agency lost its
edge there were folks inside the agency
that started started losing their
conference thinking maybe we
two and a half years later and we flew
and landed that flight and showed that
no he really can't overcome really
really large problems with technical
problems today just like we could ten
years ago 20 years ago on 50 years ago
that was an important model can we trace
the phases stumper he cleared the tower
on September 29th 1988 975 days after
the loss of Challenger and her crew the
orbiter discovery returned six veteran
astronauts in space
Floyd tracking and data relay sent
important to a number of NASA missions
SDS 26 through the comeback milestone
Mercedes photographer and initiated a
tradition that survives with the program
today during the flight we had roses
show up in the Mission Control Center
six roses five red one white and there
was a card attached to it and it simply
said congratulations return to flight we
wish you well and it was signed Marc
Terry and McKenzie Shelton didn't know
who any where but after the fight we
threw the floral company we tracked them
down so we could send him some pictures
and and something to thank them for
sending the roses to Mission Control so
the next slide
roses show up again and again it's five
roses for the members of the crew and
one rose for those who have lost their
lives in this endeavor and so this
family they have become part of our
family and they have a mystified sense
every flight since that time
and into date and I suspect they're
going to go right with us to the end of
shuttle program STS 26 ended on October
13 a VM at Edwards Air Force Base
California with the Discovery's safe
length on runway one set the triumphant
crew was greeted warmly by Vice
President George Bush on behalf of a
proud and grateful nation there's
something special about a return to
flight that makes you you have some
trepidation because it's still fresh in
your mind that you're frail and then you
can make mistakes and you're human in
the spring of 1991 on a
half-billion-dollar Hubble Space
Telescope was loaded into Space Shuttle
Discovery's payload Bay and on April 24
for sent aloft to be deployed to earth
orbit on sts-31 half time we have a go
for really discovery go for Hubble
release for the other go ability as
envisioned Hubble would return
never-before-seen images detailing our
universe as it was millions upon
millions of years before soon it would
become clear that Hubble pictures were
not several days later is not a couple
of weeks we found out after we were back
on earth that it had a problem with its
vision and most of us were just
devastated in with it here we had this
marvelous instrument that we would put
on orbit and it was going to be useless
it turned out that it wasn't useless at
all because even is with its flaw it was
still a much better telescope for
anything that we had you know on earth
shuttle mission dedicated to the
telescope's repair was planned in
essence Hubble's nearsightedness would
be corrected with a new pair of glasses
liftoff of the space shuttle Endeavour
on an ambitious vision serviced the
Hubble Space Telescope we finally flew a
sts-61 which was the first Hubble
servicing mission absolutely incredible
mission clearly we have a dynamic
high-polish you cannot take that 84 inch
mirror out of the telescope it's part of
structure too big it's there so by
putting in one box called co-star and
we're able to correct
every night for five other instruments
of all the Space Shuttle missions
replanting it was without a doubt the
most ambitious flight but the one that I
think demonstrated NASA's can-do
attitude its technological skill its
technical capability and the spirit of
its people two teams of astronauts made
a record five back-to-back spacewalks to
refurbish Hubble and realize her
potential to all and a staff while
Hubble servicing missions were very
important the true gift of a
maneuverable shuttle assumed realized
with a very different rescue mission
booster ignition and liftoff of the
maiden voyage of Endeavour on a
satellite rescue mission months earlier
in May of 1992 the seven astronauts of
sts-49
overcame initial setbacks to pluck the
hundred and eighty million dollar Intel
SATs six communication satellite from an
unusable orbit
it was going to be a very simple
rendezvous you know get close bring the
satellite down close and grapple it with
the remote manipulator system everything
that could go wrong went wrong they got
up there to capture it when the bar we
tap the satellite in the end the with
the bar and the satellite started moving
out of control
give me him hits me over the arm again
get out of it it can be very difficult
catching something like a tumbling
satellite in space the slightest touch
or miss touch by the astronaut with the
equipment and you can send that
satellite tumbling here I cure the one
you want me to Carl I could say alright
okay the other time right is just right
yeah and so it was very touch-and-go on
that mission actually commander Dan
brandenstein and pilot Kevin Tilton are
preparing for the upcoming terminal
initiate burn after several days of
failed attempts with endeavours remote
arm commander Dan brandenstein literally
tries a new approach yeah really
Oh pathetic culture did okay stop it
and endeavours helm brandenstein
delicately maneuvers the orbiter up to
the four and a half ton intel set six
the satellite is is rolling out of
control in three different axes at once
and you can actually fly the shuttle and
fly this maneuver around and keep it
aligned with it right here three people
grabbed 18,000 pounds aware that any
miscue could endanger not only the
satellite but also the ride home space
walkers peered through it Tom Akers and
Rick he'd reach out and secure the
satellite by hand
okay wait wait yes and I think we got
that way a nice job guys
Intelsat six is released from the cargo
bay with a new mini rocket motor for a
gentle push to its proper orbit where it
remains today fully functional and as
the shuttle program matured so it seemed
it relationships between the world's
spacefaring nations on STS 47 the 50th
space shuttle mission saw the orbiter
endeavour back in space on September 12
1992 the mission was a cooperative Space
Lab venture between Japan and the United
States that brought the first Japanese
astronaut into orbit as a member of the
seven person shuttle crew the space
shuttle has launched people from
different nations around this world that
used to feel they could never ever work
together and it has ushered us from the
Cold War to this really cooperative
space program that we have with our
international partners including the
former Soviet regardless of what
language you speak you speak in love
space and that's pretty cool people we
have a lot in common
engineers and scientists around the
world and that's kind of fun organ
programmers on February 3rd 1995 Eileen
Collins the first woman to pilot a
shuttle was at the helm as discovery
gave the u.s. its first up-close look at
the MIR space station
Collins flew the shuttle through a
series of intricate maneuvers
approaching within 37 feet of the
Russian spacecraft and later performing
the flyer by hand and liftoff of the
space shuttle Atlantis on a mission that
will herald a new day as international
cooperation in space four months later
on June 27th 1995 shuttle Atlantis would
lift off from the Kennedy Space Center
to begin STS 71 the u.s. space programs
100 human space mission it would take
two more days before Atlantis caught up
with and performed the first shuttle
docking with the MIR space station alas
we have capture orbiting 220 miles above
the earth a most unique and historic
celebration took place
as the MIR Space Station welcomed its
first American guests cosmonauts and
astronauts together broke figurative
bread tortillas and fruit to be exact
in a renewed spirit of cooperation
together shuttle and mir formed the
largest flying spacecraft the world had
yet to see it tipped the scales at 250
metric tons more than a half a million
pounds between 1994 98 the shuttle-mir
program would involve 11 shuttle
missions including in 1996 STS 76 which
he began a continuous u.s. presence
aboard the Russian space station with a
visit by Atlantis barely fluent in
Russian astronaut Shannon lucid a
biochemist embarked upon a mission that
would dramatically enhance our
understanding of life in space when she
finally landed at Edwards Air Force Base
on shuttle Atlantis she held the female
space endurance record for spending a
hundred and eighty eight days in orbit a
hero's welcome was in store I'm here to
say welcome home to Shannon lucid
by the time shuttle Mir ended with STS
91 seven American astronauts had
completed extended stays aboard the
Russian space station
Tatiana met Eva I became very good
friends with and I remember us sitting
in Red Square having dinner together
with a full moon and remembering when I
was a child all those those parades as
May Day parades with the tanks going by
and here we were sitting there having a
nice dinner under
a lot of friendship so just goes to show
how space can unite people and that's
one of I think one of the biggest
benefits eight cosmonauts had flown to
Mir on the u.s. shuttle and NASA
astronaut norm thagard had become the
first American to fly there or any
aboard a Soyuz
in 2001 15 years after its commissioning
Muir would be abandoned to break up and
burn in Earth's atmosphere I then the
process of building upon Mears legacy of
international cooperation and space had
already begun
whereas sts-61 had helped establish the
Hubble Space Telescope as an icon of
American ingenuity sts-95 would update
the hero's credentials of one John Glenn
on October 29 1998 almost 37 years after
becoming the first American to orbit the
Earth as an original mercury 7
astronauts Glenn now a 77 year old
former US senator made his return to
space in contrast to his first one a
three orbit four and a half hour for a
inside the smug friendship 7 capsule
liftoff of discovery with a crew of six
astronauts hero
one American legend sts-95 would take 8
days and circle the earth 134 times my
main reason for being on that cello
flight was to do research on Aging
however 77 we went up and you know NASA
has charted some 52 different changes
that occur in the human body and you've
been to space for a period of time and
the several of those are very similar to
what happens to the natural process of
Aging right here on earth body's immune
system changes you get less resistant to
disease and infection body's ability to
absorb protein back into the muscles
changes for the young people up there
and for elderly here on earth the
objective was to take those things that
are the same and see if we couldn't find
any differences between my experience up
there and they're younger and the
younger people I would fly with with the
idea of finding in the human body what
turns these different systems on and off
if we could do that we might be able to
make it possible for people to stay in
space longer and without harmful effects
and maybe cut out some of the frailties
of old age right here on earth
I really was happy to be
the flight an interesting twist of fate
astronaut Glenn not only inspired both
the young and old around the globe but
also at fresh political science and
economics graduate lori garver the 18th
deputy administrator of nasa having the
ability at nasa to fly him again in
space after his first flight was
something we I think gave the nation and
it really helped explain what we were
doing on the space shuttle John Glenn
was very very focused I'm doing that
experience those experiments or both I
think the older generation but he was
also an inspiration to people growing up
discovery carried a variety of payloads
and research experiments arguably the
one most valuable was Glenn himself not
only did he provide first-time data on
what space flight might do to the body
of a septa generic Glenn also raised the
interest of a nation and the world in
America's space shuttle while the
program had and continued to
successfully deploying service
science probes and satellites as well as
conduct on-orbit research the Space
Shuttle undertook a new long-range task
perfectly suited to her specialized
capabilities you've got a spacecraft
that can carry at least seven people and
a little bit and with those seven people
you can do a huge amount of work one
mission you can do multiple Olivier's
you've got multiple crew members you've
got a huge payload and just all kinds of
capabilities to be able to construct and
build bigger things on less than two
weeks after the Glenn's returned to
Earth a Russian Proton rocket departs
the Baikonur cosmodrome in Kazakhstan
carrying the zarya module the first
component of the new International Space
Station liftoff of the proton rocket and
the Soviet control module
International Space Station is underway
to example a space shuttle endeavour
follows up with delivery of America's
unity module the second piece of this
largest Space Station puzzle ever to be
constructed
is an endeavor we have captured aiya
it's not until July 2000 will the
Russian Zvezda module yeah finally
allowing 14 Russian cosmonauts and their
American expedition 1 commander bill
Shepard to journey aboard a Soyuz
spacecraft to the International Space
Station and begin humankind's continuous
extraterrestrial presence across the
world people are very very interested in
and delighted by the International Space
Station and the science that has taken
place there since only an orbiters
payload Bay could hold the station's
largest components the multi-year
multi-million servicing of the ISS with
cargo and crew would become primarily a
job for the shuttle
amid these dynamic station building
missions one seemingly simple and
relatively uncomplicated flight would
prove problematic and threaten the very
future of America's human spaceflight
program
since 1988 the Space Shuttle had
completed 15 years of successful
missions each was unique each had its
own specific goals and tasks and each
had its own dedicated crew of astronauts
who trained exhaustively to meet and
carry them out yet each of those 87
points did have two things in common
safe launch liftoff of the space shuttle
Discovery safe land
nose gear touchdown from start
sts-107 seem to be a mission out of
science by the time Columbia was fine
ready to fly on January 16 2003 its
planned 16-day mission had been delayed
no fewer than 18 times all those delays
have ultimately positioned the sts-107
as a sort of black sheet on the space
shuttle programs launch schedule
Columbia's crew commander Rick husband
pilot Willie McCool and mission
specialists Michael Anderson Kalpana
Chawla Dave Brown Laurel Clark and
Israeli astronaut Ilan Ramon would not
go for the National Space Station their
flight would require nothing more risky
than orbiting the earth booster ignition
and liftoff of space shuttle Columbia
with a multitude of National
International Space Research
82 seconds after launch what was later
described as a suitcase sized chunk of
frozen foam insulation breaks off
Columbia's external tank and strikes the
leading edge of the orbiters left wing
Roger welcomed on a routine same-day
video review with the lodge would reveal
nothing unusual however higher
resolution tracking camera film
processed overnight and reviewed on
flight date to buy the missions assent
team showed up and you saw this little
thing float toward the leading edge of
the wing and like you know is like a
snowball hitting something and then just
being pulverized but but when you saw it
hit ooh we just we just winced because
we knew you know the vehicles going 500
miles an hour or better it was
inconceivable in hindsight that you
could have that kind of impact at the
speed that the vehicle is going and
assume that there was no damage and
that's what we we allowed ourselves to
feel comfortable that we were right and
we were dead wrong
due to limitations in the visual clarity
the exact point of impact and extent of
any damage could not be determined if
the foam strike had compromised
Columbia's integrity little if anything
can be done to repair the orbiter in
space one week after launch
Mission Control emails the crew
informing of the debris strike save for
a relatively minor problem with a leaky
refrigeration unit sts-107 had been
without furtherance
the order is given on the morning of
February 1st
for the Columbia crew to begin the
landing procedure and come home to
Florida traveling in excess of 12,000
miles per hour the orbiters belly begins
to glow red as it descends into Earth's
atmosphere fYI I've just lost four
separate temperature transducers on the
left side of the vehicle
hydraulic recurrent temperatures as
re-entry started and as the ground track
went across the states there's a ground
track of course changes color you can
tell where the shuttle is over what part
of the country
it is no on board well that display
stopped updating in other words that
display pros in a certain position well
sometimes you have loss of data you have
some problem with the system on the
ground where you'll have those kind of
allergens temporarily well this lasted a
bit longer then the call went up to the
crew you know call went up and no
response well I know I just I just begin
to feel uneasy Columbia Houston UHF comm
check
at speeds above Mach 20 the stress
becomes too much for the orbiter we do
not have any valid data at this time the
suitcase sized chunk of folk and indeed
since the bowling ball-sized hole in the
leading edge of Columbia's left work
within seconds internal temperature spec
signaling the cascade of structural
disintegration only 16 minutes from home
space shuttle Columbia breaks apart in
the skies over these Texas all seven
crew members at once
GC plank why'd you say back the doors
copy and in and at that moment I knew I
knew we lost them the grief is heavy
our nation shares in your sorrow and in
your pride and today we remember not
only one moment of tragedy but seven
lives of great purpose and achievement
within days hundreds of professionals
from federal and state agencies across
the country arrived in these Texas they
are joined by local volunteers to help
NASA recover and catalog debris from
Columbia in the hopes of literally
piecing together an answer to the
accidents cause this is one of the many
obstacles investigators are up against
it was a really heartwarming and very
emotional for me to see all of these
people from around the country come in
the Piney Woods of East Texas and spend
days and weeks there marching out
through these through the woods looking
for bits and pieces of the orbiter and
so forth if anybody ever wonders about
the strength of the backbone of this
country then they ought to have the
privilege like I do to meet these people
who have come here to do this it just it
shows you the fabric of what this
country is made up
determined to return to flight stronger
and safer the grounded shuttle program
had taken the fresh look at itself
during my watch during my watch
we lost the Columbia crew and clearly as
a flight director vac and Challenger we
lost that crew I think about those every
day every day I come to work I need to
be very vigilant I need to pay attention
and I need the people that work for us
in this business to pay attention to
what you're doing because this is hard
stuff that we do it's very dangerous we
have not figured out a way to do a beam
me up Scottie right now it takes a lot
of hydrocarbons moving at very high
speeds to fuel pumps at very high
temperatures high pressures to get in
the space and it takes a tremendous
amount of effort to get out of space
back in the atmosphere and get to get
home I was sent out to David Brown's
parents home I'll never forget this
moment when Judge Brown looked at me and
said Leland my son is gone there is
nothing can do to bring him back but the
biggest tragedy would be if you don't
continue to fly and carry on his legacy
each of the remaining three orbiters was
pulled apart and refurbished new
capabilities were devised for the crew
and mission controllers to assess and
repair damage while on-orbit
processes and procedures were also
reexamined and reinvigorated crew safety
would never again be taken for granted
nearly two and a half years would pass
before the nation would see another
orbiter poised for launch from the
Kennedy Space Center the time that we
fly the flight it's something that it
feels like we have flown many times so
if things don't go well it becomes very
very natural for us to know at certain
points during the mission if this
doesn't go well or this significant
system breaks we have this type of
emergency what's the most important
thing we need to do now because we've
been rehearsing and it makes it look
really easy you don't really get the
full effect of
like real preparation how much real
studying went into making it looked at
easy of all the changes accompanying the
shuttles return to flight acted none was
more significant than the one announced
in early 2004 at NASA headquarters by
President Bush our first goal is to
complete the International Space Station
by 2010 we will finish what we have
started we will meet our obligations to
our 15 international partners on this
project
the shuttles chief purpose over the next
several years will be to help finish
Assembly of the International Space
Station in 2010 the Space Shuttle after
nearly 30 years of Duty will be retired
from service even though each shuttle
was designed to fly 100 missions the
Columbia accident investigation board
called the shuttle an aging spacecraft
with the odds of losing another orbiter
and crew increasing with each subsequent
flight NASA's human spaceflight program
was faced with several basic challenges
including coming up with a successor to
the shuttle fleet however with an
impending cancellation of the shuttle
program looming shuttle managers
recommitted themselves to the paramount
task of safely completing the
International Space Station it would
become the program's mantra to be
repeated over and over again not only to
the media but also for every worker in
the shuttle program no launch scheduled
plus two times and no mission too
important to be rushed we are to treat
every flight in a sense as a return to
flight this is truly a test program we
go back we make sure everything is right
we double-check and then we go commit in
a Flight Readiness review that we're
actually
why on July 26 2005 discovery gets the
shuttle program flying again this is 10
seconds go for main engine start seven
six five three engines up and burning
three two one and liftoff of space
shuttle Discovery beginning America's
new journey and the vehicle has cleared
the tower
among the many changes institute the new
r-bar pitch maneuver backflip station
discovery mixing a rpm and three two one
five will be used by each mission to the
International Space Station at arrival
the end over end flip allows the station
crew to visually document the condition
of the shuttles belyanov Stevie Ray
sweetie Andy Vegas charlie Wendy and
Eileen
welcome home friends with this
practically rebuilt space transportation
system each remaining shuttle mission
would be safer than the one before and
its final flight the safest it's almost
like we have three different space
shuttle programs first ten years we're
off learning how to fly the thing
deploying satellites flying laboratories
in the back next ten years we're doing
more of that and we're going out on more
and more spacewalks and fly up to the
MIR Space Station and in the last 10
years we use it to build about a million
pound space station in orbit which
wouldn't have been possible without sho
back of a machine when you look at
Hubble Space Telescope that would not
have been possible without shuttle and
you look at the International Space
Station which certainly would not have
been possible without shuttle or every
launch is an emotional experience
watching what this nation is done what
NASA is going to pick the NASA
contractor team it's awesome it's
wonderful we didn't spend a dime inspect
not one single penny has been spent
instead every single penny that went
into the space shuttle program over its
30-plus years was spent right here on
earth 1 creating jobs growing our
economy creating technological
development of which we never dream
advancing science and technology even
advancing the field of Aeronautics it
just impresses me what people can do
what people can do it's a big machine
it's a nice machine is a fantastic
engineering marvel in my opinion the
whole space shuttle but what's the real
marvel was the people behind it then
make it go having a space shuttle
enabled us to be able to complete our
science we do some really great things
to advance the area of metallurgy
without the space shuttle and experiment
like this one could not have been
conducted the shuttle is very important
for us to learn and be able to conduct
long period experiments out of the 50
states 48 of them have vendors that
provide parts or equipment to the space
shuttle program so it's a vast the cross
section of America that makes the
American space program what it is change
is inevitable as much as people don't
like change with the only thing that's
constant in our lives and we have to
change that the transition from shuttle
to a new future which we're going to
define which can be even better a future
that allows us to explore beyond our
home planets that seek our destiny to
learn what we couldn't possibly learn if
we were stuck in low-earth orbit
and since its returned to flight the
shuttle program has been almost
singularly focused on completing
construction of the space station I
think back of all the challenges and all
the things have had to work right you
know a lot of these interfaces never
came together before all the shuttle
flights the 20 plus shuttle flights that
went into assembly all the Soyuz flights
to progress flights to see this station
come together and assembly is a true
testimony to the international
partnership this is probably the most
amazing research facility ever
constructed in space and it's
constructed internationally and it
operates every day 24 hours a day doing
world-class research internationally and
there is no more amazing facility than
what we have in orbit through and
possibly beyond 2020 the ISS will serve
as the world's first full-time research
laboratory in microgravity among zero-g
experiments already conducted aboard the
station several have led to promising
breakthroughs in the research and
treatment of cancer many other on-orbit
science findings have the potential to
significantly improve the quality of
life back on earth in May 2009
Atlantis and its sts-125 crew took to
space not to visit the ISS but to return
to the Hubble Space Telescope there is
final servicing mission on five
spacewalks Atlantis astronauts repaired
and upgraded a Hubble telescope Inc to
significantly improve its capacity to
explore the depths of the universe until
at least 2014 I think of all the
fingerprints that are all over this time
it's a phenomenal piece of machinery
it's a phenomenal airplane and it really
isn't Anthony remarked the space shuttle
will go down in history as one of the
great flying machines that America has
produced a space shuttle you know at
this time was a vehicle for bringing
people together from all around the
planet and having us work in harmony for
the betterment of humankind we may not
have understood when we first built it
what all we'd be able to accomplish with
it and after many years we've realized
just how useful it has been it's been a
learning experience on how to operate
and live in
what can you say about the space shuttle
it has changed everything
well the shuttle from my perspective is
one of the great things that this nation
is done it was a lot of time like I said
it it's inspiring to come to work every
single day to work on this program I'd
go tomorrow if I had the opportunity has
been handed for more than thirty years
the fleet thousands of Americans
dedicated to a safety and success have
toiled in exhilarating triumph
heartbreaking tragedy and most often
quiet obscurity their contributions have
extended they are the bounds of space
among others shuttle-derived
technologies have been used in
developing an artificial heart and limbs
three-dimensional biotechnology a light
for treating tumors and children and
improving crime prevention and wildfire
detection
from crawler driver to payload
specialist from scuba-dive to pilot from
scientist to engineer they and many like
throughout the nation share a commitment
to sending humankind safely into space
that dedication as much as any other
acclaim will be the legacy of America's
space shuttle I think will be remembered
in thousands of years you know as
perhaps the most incredible
technological feat of humans of our kind
as is the order of life an ending for
the Space Shuttle becomes a beginning
for a space pound successor soon America
will again send astronauts into war and
beyond to do what NASA does best
you
you
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