Also See:
NASA | NASA | NASA | NASA | NASA | NASA | NASA | NASA | NASA | NASA | NASA | NASA | NASA | NASA | NASA | NASA | NASA | NASA | NASA | NASA | NASA | NASA | NASA | NASA | NASA | NASA | NASA | NASA | NASA | NASA | NASA | NASA | NASA | NASA | NASA | NASA | NASA | NASA | NASA | NASA | NASA | NASA | NASA | NASA | NASA | NASA | NASA | NASA | NASA | NASA | NASA | NASA | NASA | NASA | NASA | NASA | NASA | NASA | NASA | NASA | NASA | NASA | NASA | NASA | NASA | NASA | NASA | NASA | NASA | NASA | NASA | NASA | NASA | NASA | NASA | NASA | NASA | NASA | NASA | NASA | NASA | NASA | NASA | NASA | NASA | NASA | NASA | NASA | NASA | NASA | NASA | NASA | NASA | NASA | NASA | NASA | NASA | NASA | NASA | NASA | NASA

America's first space station, the 75 ton Skylab was launched May 14, 1973 by a two-stage version of the Saturn V booster (the SL-1 mission). Severe damage was sustained during launch, including the loss of the station's micrometeoroid shield/sun shade and one of its main solar panels. Debris from the lost micrometeroid shield further complicated matters by pinning the remaining solar panel to the side of the station, preventing its deployment and thus leaving the station with a huge power deficit. The station underwent a extensive repair by the first crew launched on May 25, 1973 (the SL-2 mission) atop a Saturn 1B. Two additional missions followed on July 28, 1973 (SL-3) and November 16, 1973 (SL-4) with stay times of 28, 59, and 84 days, respectively. The last Skylab crew returned to Earth on February 8, 1974.

Skylab was actually the refitted S-IVB third stage of a Saturn V booster, a leftover from the Apollo program originally intended for one of the canceled moon landing missions (Apollos 18-20). A product of the Apollo Applications program (a program tasked with finding long-term uses for Apollo program hardware), Skylab was originally planned as a minimially-altered S-IVB to be launched on a Saturn IB rocket. The small size of the IB would have required Skylab to double as a rocket stage during launch, only being retrofitted as a space station once on-orbit. With the cancellation of Apollo missions 18-20 a Saturn V was made available and thus the "Wet Workshop" concept, as it was called, was put aside and Skylab was launched dry and fully outfitted. Skylab's grid flooring system is a highly visable legacy of the wet workshop concept.

Following the last mission the Station was positioned in a parking orbit expected to last at least 8 years. Increased solar activity heating the outer layers of the earth's atmosphere and thereby increasing drag on the Station led to an early reentry on July 11, 1979. Skylab disintegrated over Western Australia and the Indian Ocean, casting large pieces of debris in populated areas (without injury). The reentry prevented any further use by the then unfinished Space Shuttle as was envisioned by some at NASA.

Two flight-quality Skylabs were built, the second, a backup, is on display at the National Air and Space Museum in Washington, DC.

Catherine Coleman
participated at the analysis of the Long Duration Exposure Facility (LDEF) experiment launched with STS-41-C and retrieved with STS-32. In 1991 she received doctorate in polymer science and engineering from the University of Massachusetts. She was selected by NASA in 1992 to become a mission specialist astronaut. She took part in two space shuttle missions so far. In 1995 she was member of the STS-73 crew on the scientific mission USML-1 with experiments including biotechnology, combustion science and the physics of fluids. She also trained for the mission STS-83 to be the backup for Donald Thomas, however as he recovered on time she did not fly that mission. STS-93 was Catherine Coleman second space flight. On that mission the Chandra X-ray Observatory was sent to orbit.

Teacher in Space Project
Teacher in Space Project Christa McAuliffe (left) and Barbara Morgan pose in front of the Space Shuttle mission simulator (SMS) after their selection for TISP. The Teacher in Space Project (TISP) is a NASA program designed to educate students and spur excitement in math, science, and space exploration. Christa McAuliffe was selected to be the first teacher in space in 1984 with Barbara Morgan as her alternate. McAuliffe died during the launch of the 25th Space Shuttle mission, STS-51-L, which was to make her the first teacher in space. NASA halted the TISP until 1998 amid concerns surrounding the risk of sending civillians to space. Morgan was selected as the first Educator Astronaut in January, 1998. Morgan is assigned to the crew of STS-118 which may launch

But there was no way that a space station or Air Force payloads could demand such rates (roughly 1 to 2 per week), so they went further and suggested that all future US launches would take place on the shuttle, once built. In order to do this the cost of launching the shuttle would have to be lower than any other system with the exception of the very small, which they ignored for practical reasons, and very large, which were rare and terribly expensive anyway.

Discover NASA

The Shuttle in retrospect

Whilst the shuttle has been a reasonably successful launch vehicle, it had been unable to meet its goals of radically reducing flight launch costs, as each flight costs on the order of $500 million rather than initial projections of $10 to $20 million.

Although the design is radically different than the original concept, the project was still supposed to meet the upgraded AF goals as well as be much cheaper to fly in general. What went wrong?

One issue appears to be inflation. During the 1970s the US suffered from the worst inflation in modern history, driving up costs about 200% by 1980. In contrast, the rate between 1990 and 2000 was only 34% in total. This has the effect of magnifying the development costs of the shuttle tremendously.

However this doesn't explain the high costs of the continued operations of the shuttle. Even accounting for inflation the launch costs on the original estimates should be about $100 million today. To explain this you have to look at the operational details of maintaining and servicing the shuttle fleet, which have turned out to be tremendously more expensive than anticipated.

When originally conceived the shuttle was to operate similar to an airliner. After landing the Orbiter would be checked out and start "mating" to the rest of the system (the ET and SRBs) and be ready for launch in as little as two weeks. Instead this turnaround process in fact takes months. This is due, in turn, to the continued "upgrading" of the inspection process as a result of hardware decisions made to reduce short-term development costs which resulted in higher maintenance requirements which where exacerbated by the fallout from the loss of Challenger. Even simple tasks now require unbelievable amounts of paperwork. This paperwork results from the fact that, unlike current expendable launch vehicles, the Space Shuttle is manned and has no escape systems to speak of and therefore any accident which would result in the loss of booster would also result in the loss of the crew which is, of course, unacceptable. Because loss of crew is unacceptable, the primary focus of the shuttle program is to return the crew to earth safely, which can conflict with other goals, namely to launch satellites cheaply. Furthermore, because there are cases where there are no abort modes, no potential way to prevent failure from becoming critical, many pieces of hardware simply must function perfectly and so must be carefully inspected before each flight.

The result is a massively inflated manpower bill. There are 25,000 workers in shuttle operations (perhaps an older number), so simply multiply any figure that you choose for an average annual salary, divide by six (or 4 or 7...launches per year), and there you have it.

The lessons of the shuttle have been seen as different depending on who you ask. In general, however, future designers look to systems with only one stage, automated checkout, and in some cases, overdesigned (more durable) low-tech systems.

Perhaps the most annoying aspect of the shuttle system is to consider the Air Force participation. While the blame rests solely at the feet of NASA for getting them involved in the first place, it was the Air Force requirements that drove the system to be as complex and expensive as it is today. Ironically neither NASA nor the Air Force got the system they wanted or needed, and the Air Force eventually threw in the towel and returned to their older launch systems and abandoned their Vandenburg shuttle launch plans. The capabilities which most seriously hobbled the Shuttle system, namely the 65,000 payload, large payload bay, and 1000 mile cross-range, have in fact, except for the payload bay, never been used.

Shuttles

Space Camp
Space Camp Space Camp is a 1986 movie which was based on a book written by Patrick Bailey and Larry B Williams and a screenplay by WW Wicket and Casey T Mitchell. In the movie, four teenagers and a twelve year old boy go to a NASA space camp, to spend three weeks of their summer training as astronauts and learning about the space program in general. There, they will meet a female instructor who is frustrated at the fact she still hasn't gotten a chance to be up there, despite this being her life's dream. But things start to unravel when the 12 year old boy, Max, saves the life of a robot named Jinx, and, to return the favor, Jinx decides to send Max