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With the budgets being pressed by inflation at home and the Vietnam war abroad, Congress and the Administration generally couldn't care less about anything as long-term as space exploration and were therefore looking to make further deep cuts to NASAs budget. But with a single long term project on the books, there wasn't much they could do in terms of cutting whole projects -- the shuttle was all that was left, cut that and there would be no US manned space program by 1980.

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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

Hubble Space Telescope
Hubble Space Telescope The Hubble Space Telescope (HST, or Hubble) is a telescope located at the outer edges of Earth's atmosphere, about 600 kilometerss above the ground, orbiting the Earth every 100 minutes. It was placed into orbit, in April 1990, as a joint project of NASA and the ESA. The telescope can achieve optical resolutions greater than 0.1 arcseconds. The HST is named after Edwin Hubble. It is scheduled for replacement, by the James Webb Space Telescope (JWST), in 2009. Every day, the Hubble Space Telescope archives 3 to 5 gigabytes of data and delivers between 10 and 15 gigabytes to astronomers. Working outside the atmosphere has advantages because the atmosphere obscures images and filters out electromagnetic radiation at certain wavelengths, mainly in the infrared. Hubble

The result was that the simple DC-3 was clearly out of the picture because it had neither the cargo capacity nor the cross-range the Air Force demanded. In fact all existing designs were far too small, as a 40,000 lbs delivery to polar orbit equates to a 65,000 lbs delivery to a "normal" 28 degree equatorial orbit. In fact any design using simple straight or fold-out wings was not going to meet the cross range requirements, so any future design would require a more complex, heavier delta wing. 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.

Space Shuttle Discovery
Space Shuttle Discovery Shuttle Orbiter Discovery (NASA Designation: OV-103) is a NASA Space Shuttle. First flown on August 30, 1984, Discovery is the third operational shuttle (excluding test shuttle 'Enterprise'). The orbiter is still operational today, and has performed both research and International Space Station (ISS) assembly missions. The craft takes its name from a ship used by explorer James Cook. Table of contents showTocToggle("show","hide") 1 Flights 1..1 Related articles 1..2

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.