50 Fun Facts About Space Shuttle

Between 1981 and 2011, how many missions did the Space Shuttle fleet fly in total?

Five orbiters flew in space; a sixth, Enterprise, never left the atmosphere.

What did the programme's official abbreviation STS stand for?

The name came from a 1969 plan led by Vice President Spiro Agnew for a whole family of reusable spacecraft, of which only the Shuttle was funded.

On what date did the Space Shuttle launch for the first time, on mission STS-1?

It was exactly 20 years after Yuri Gagarin's first human spaceflight.

Which two astronauts flew STS-1, the first Space Shuttle mission?

It was the first time NASA had put a crew aboard a spacecraft on its very first flight; the mission lasted two days.

Which US president approved development of the Space Shuttle in January 1972?

NASA settled on the final design two months later and awarded the orbiter contract that August.

Which company built the Space Shuttle orbiters?

Separate contractors built the external tank and the solid rocket boosters.

The first orbiter, Enterprise, was originally going to be given what name?

It was to be unveiled on Constitution Day, September 17, 1976, until Star Trek fans wrote to President Ford.

Why was the prototype orbiter named Enterprise?

Gene Roddenberry and most of the original series cast attended the roll-out ceremony.

Enterprise never flew in space; what was it used for in 1977?

It was released from the back of a Boeing 747 five times to glide to landings at Edwards Air Force Base.

Which orbiter was the first to fly in space?

It was named after the sloop Columbia Rediviva, the first American ship to circle the globe, and after the Apollo 11 command module.

Which orbiter, built in 1991 to replace Challenger, was named after Captain Cook's ship?

Its British spelling comes straight from HMS Endeavour; it flew 25 missions from 1992 to 2011.

Challenger was named after HMS Challenger, a British corvette that led what kind of voyage in the 1870s?

The Apollo 17 lunar module had also been named Challenger.

Which orbiter flew the most missions, 39 over 27 years?

It carried the Hubble Space Telescope into orbit and flew both 'return to flight' missions after the two disasters.

The Space Shuttle stack at launch had the orbiter, two solid rocket boosters and what else?

The tank held the liquid hydrogen and liquid oxygen for the main engines and was the only part not reused.

Why was the external tank orange rather than white on most missions?

The first two tanks were painted white; skipping the paint from STS-3 saved about 272 kg (600 lb).

Which company developed the RS-25 main engines mounted at the orbiter's tail?

They were the first throttleable, reusable rocket engines; a rival protested the 1971 contract and delayed work for most of a year.

What share of the Shuttle's thrust at liftoff came from the two solid rocket boosters?

They burned for about two minutes, then parachuted into the Atlantic to be recovered and reused.

What became of the solid rocket boosters after burnout, about two minutes after launch?

They were the largest solid-propellant motors ever flown until 2022 and the first designed for reuse.

Which company in Brigham City, Utah, manufactured the solid rocket booster motor segments?

After the Challenger disaster the booster joints were redesigned to seal at any temperature.

The orbiter's underside was protected on re-entry by tiles made mainly of what?

The LI-900 tiles were so light and fragile you could crush one by hand; the nose cap and wing edges used tougher reinforced carbon-carbon instead.

At roughly what speed did the orbiter begin re-entry, at an altitude of 120 km?

It then glided, unpowered, to a runway landing at Kennedy or Edwards.

When an orbiter landed at Edwards Air Force Base in California, how was it returned to Florida?

NASA had two Shuttle Carrier Aircraft; the first was originally built for American Airlines.

How big was the orbiter's payload bay?

The size was dictated by the Air Force's spy-satellite requirements; the bay doors doubled as radiators in orbit.

The Shuttle's robotic arm was supplied by which country and nicknamed accordingly?

Built by Spar Aerospace in Toronto, it was first tested in orbit on STS-2 in 1981.

Who funded Spacelab, the pressurised lab module flown in the payload bay on 28 missions?

Its first full mission was STS-9 in 1983, and it studied astronomy, microgravity and life sciences.

What was the typical size of a Space Shuttle crew?

STS-61-A flew with eight; the four early test flights carried only a commander and pilot.

Why did NASA never schedule a Shuttle flight to span December into January?

The flight software would have needed the orbiter's computers to be reset at midnight on December 31.

Who became the first American woman in space, aboard Challenger on STS-7 in June 1983?

At 32 she was also the youngest American to fly, and she later served on both accident investigation panels.

Who became the first African American in space, on Challenger's STS-8 mission in 1983?

STS-8 was also the Shuttle's first night launch and night landing.

On January 28, 1986, Challenger broke apart how long after liftoff?

The entire crew was killed and the fleet was grounded for over two years.

What was the technical cause of the Challenger disaster?

The seals had stiffened in the unusually cold Florida morning, which physicist Richard Feynman famously demonstrated with a glass of ice water.

Christa McAuliffe was chosen from over 11,000 applicants for which NASA project?

She taught social studies at Concord High School in New Hampshire; her backup, Barbara Morgan, finally flew in 2007.

Which body did President Reagan create to investigate the Challenger accident?

Its members included Neil Armstrong, Chuck Yeager and Richard Feynman.

The orbiter lost on February 1, 2003, disintegrated on re-entry over which two states?

It was the orbiter's 28th flight and the fleet's 113th.

In the 2003 re-entry disaster, what had caused the fatal damage to the orbiter's left wing?

The foam broke off at launch and struck the wing's leading edge, letting hot gas in during re-entry 16 days later.

Which crew member of the STS-107 flight lost in 2003 was the first Israeli astronaut?

A colonel in the Israeli Air Force, he flew as a payload specialist on his first spaceflight.

On which mission was the Hubble Space Telescope launched in April 1990?

Hubble's mirror turned out to be flawed; the STS-61 servicing mission fixed it in 1993.

What optical flaw was discovered in Hubble's main mirror after launch?

The mirror had been ground to the wrong shape; corrective optics were installed by shuttle astronauts in 1993.

Between 1995 and 1998, how many times did a Space Shuttle dock with the Russian station Mir?

One orbiter made all of the early docking flights, starting with STS-71.

Who was the first woman to pilot, and later command, a Space Shuttle mission?

She piloted STS-63 in 1995 and commanded STS-93 in 1999, which deployed an X-ray telescope.

Which Mercury veteran flew on STS-95 in 1998, aged 77, then the oldest person in space?

He was a sitting US senator at the time.

Which astronaut is the only person to have flown aboard all five space-going orbiters?

He was payload commander on the first Hubble repair mission and holds six academic degrees.

STS-1 commander John Young had earlier walked on the Moon in 1972 as commander of which Apollo mission?

He is the only astronaut to have flown Gemini, the Apollo command module, the lunar module and the Shuttle.

Which orbiter flew STS-135, the final Space Shuttle mission, landing on July 21, 2011?

Its four-person crew was the smallest since 1983, and it delivered the Raffaello logistics module to the ISS.

Which museum has displayed the prototype orbiter Enterprise since 2012?

The three surviving space-flown orbiters are split between Kennedy, the Udvar-Hazy Center and Los Angeles.

The Shuttle program's $192bn cost over 135 flights works out to roughly how much per launch?

That was far above the low-cost, airline-style operations originally promised.

The Soviet Union's answer to the Shuttle, Buran, made how many spaceflights?

After its 1988 flight it sat in a hangar at Baikonur until the roof collapsed on it in 2002.

What was the design lifespan of each Space Shuttle orbiter?

The programme ran so long that the limit was later extended.

What was the heaviest payload ever carried into orbit by a Space Shuttle?

It rode up in 1999 aboard the same orbiter that had deployed the Shuttle's first satellites on STS-5.

Which NASA facility was the hub for all Shuttle flight operations, from crews to mission control?

Marshall handled the main engines, tank and boosters, Stennis tested the engines, and Goddard ran the tracking network.