space exploration: The Space Shuttle

After the Skylab space station fell out of orbit in 1979, the United States did not resume sending astronauts into space until 1981, when the space shuttle, capable of ferrying people and equipment into orbit and back to earth, was launched. The shuttle itself was a hypersonic delta-wing airplane about the size of a DC-9. Takeoff was powered by three liquid-fuel engines fed from an external tank and two solid-fuel engines; the last were recovered by parachute. The shuttle itself returned to earth in a controlled glide, landing either in California or in Florida.

The shuttle put a payload of up to 25 tons (22,700 kg) in earth orbit below 600 mi (970 km); the payload was then boosted into final orbit by its own attached rocket. The Galileo probe, designed to investigate Jupiter's upper atmosphere, was launched from the space shuttle. Astronauts also used the shuttle to retrieve and repair satellites, to experiment with construction techniques needed for a permanent space station, and to conduct scientific experiments during extended periods in space.

At first it was hoped that shuttle flights could operate on a monthly basis, but schedule pressures contributed to the explosion of the Challenger shuttle in 1986, when cold launch conditions led to the failure of a rubber O-ring, and the resulting flame ruptured the main fuel tank. The shuttle program was suspended for three years, while the entire system was redesigned. The shuttle fleet subsequently operated on approximately a bimonthly schedule. A second accident occurred in 2003, when Columbia was lost during reentry because damaged heat shielding on the left wing, which had been damaged by insulation shed from the external fuel tank, failed to prevent superheated gas from entering the wing; the hot gas structurally weakened the wing and caused the shuttle to break up. Shuttle flights resumed in July, 2005, but new problems with fuel tank insulation led NASA to suspend shuttle launches for a year. The last shuttle flight was in July, 2011.

In 2004, President George W. Bush called for a return to the moon by 2020 and the establishment of a base there that would be used to support the human exploration of Mars. The following year NASA unveiled a $104 billion plan for a lunar expedition that resembled that Apollo program in many respects, except that two rockets would be used to launch the crew and lunar lander separately.

In June, 2004, SpaceShipOne, a privately financed spacecraft utilizing a reusable vehicle somewhat similar in concept to the shuttle, was launched into suborbital flight from the Mojave Desert in California. Unlike the shuttle, SpaceShipOne was carried aloft by a reusable jet mothership (White Knight) to 46,000 ft (13.8 km), where it was released and fires its rocket engine. The spacecraft was designed by Bert Rutan and built by his company, SCALED Composites. The vehicle's 90-minute flight was the first successful nongovernmental spaceflight. SpaceShipTwo, based on SpaceShipOne, is being developed for commercial tourist flights; it made its first powered flight in 2013. Another spacecraft was privately developed by Space Exploration Technologies, or SpaceX, in coordination with NASA. The company's Falcon 9 rocket had its first successful launch, from Cape Canaveral, in June, 2010. In May, 2012, SpaceX's Dragon space capsule made its first resupply trip to the space station. Orbital Sciences Corp. (OSC) also developed a cargo capsule, Cygnus, in cooperation with NASA. OSC's Antares rocket, which is used to launch Cygnus, had its first test in Apr., 2013, and Cygnus had its first resupply flight later that year. A crew version of the Dragon first traveled to the space station in May–Aug., 2020, having undergone a crewless test flight the year before. In Dec., 2019, the Starliner, a crew capsule developed by Boeing in coordination with NASA, had its first, crewless test flight.

Sections in this article:

• Introduction
• The Chinese Space Program
• The Space Shuttle
• Space Stations
• The Soyuz Program
• The Apollo Program
• Human Space Exploration
• Interplanetary Probes
• Lunar Probes
• Satellites and Probes
• Bibliography

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