The Space Shuttle was a partially reusable low Earth orbital spacecraft system operated from 1981 to 2011 by the National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA) as part of the Space Shuttle program. Its official program name was Space Transportation System (STS), taken from a 1969 plan for a system of reusable spacecraft where it was the only item funded for development. The first of four orbital test flights occurred in 1981, leading to operational flights beginning in 1982. Five complete Space Shuttle orbiter vehicles were built and flown on a total of 135 missions from 1981 to 2011, launched from the Kennedy Space Center (KSC) in Florida. Operational missions launched numerous satellites, Interplanetary probes, and the Hubble Space Telescope (HST); conducted science experiments in orbit; participated in the Shuttle-Mir program with Russia; and participated in construction and servicing of the International Space Station (ISS). The Space Shuttle fleet's total mission time was 1322 days, 19 hours, 21 minutes and 23 seconds.
Atmospheric entry is the movement of an object from outer space into and through the gases of an atmosphere of a planet, dwarf planet, or natural satellite. There are two main types of atmospheric entry: uncontrolled entry, such as the entry of astronomical objects, space debris, or bolides; and controlled entry of a spacecraft capable of being navigated or following a predetermined course. Technologies and procedures allowing the controlled atmospheric entry, descent, and landing of spacecraft are collectively termed as EDL.
Gemini 9A was a 1966 crewed spaceflight in NASA's Gemini program. It was the seventh crewed Gemini flight, the 13th crewed American flight and the 23rd spaceflight of all time. The original crew for Gemini 9, command pilot Elliot See and pilot Charles Bassett, were killed in a crash on February 28, 1966 while flying a T-38 jet trainer to the McDonnell Aircraft plant in St. Louis, Missouri to inspect their spacecraft. Their deaths promoted the backup crew, Thomas P. Stafford and Eugene Cernan, to the prime crew. The mission was renamed Gemini 9A after the original May 17 launch was scrubbed when the mission's Agena Target Vehicle was destroyed after a launch failure. The mission was flown June 3–6, 1966, after launch of the backup Augmented Target Docking Adaptor (ATDA). Stafford and Cernan rendezvoused with the ATDA, but were unable to dock with it because the nose fairing failed to eject from the docking target due to a launch preparation error. Cernan performed a two-hour extravehicular activity, during which it was planned for him to demonstrate free flight in a self-contained rocket pack, the USAF Astronaut Maneuvering Unit. He was unable to accomplish this due to stress, fatigue, and overheating.
The Boeing X-20 Dyna-Soar was a United States Air Force (USAF) program to develop a spaceplane that could be used for a variety of military missions, including aerial reconnaissance, bombing, space rescue, satellite maintenance, and as a space interceptor to sabotage enemy satellites. The program ran from October 24, 1957 to December 10, 1963, cost US$660 million, and was cancelled just after spacecraft construction had begun.
The DC-X, short for Delta Clipper or Delta Clipper Experimental, was an uncrewed prototype of a reusable single-stage-to-orbit launch vehicle built by McDonnell Douglas in conjunction with the United States Department of Defense's Strategic Defense Initiative Organization (SDIO) from 1991 to 1993. Starting 1994 until 1995, testing continued through funding of the US civil space agency NASA. In 1996, the DC-X technology was completely transferred to NASA, which upgraded the design for improved performance to create the DC-XA.
The Manned Orbiting Laboratory (MOL) was part of the United States Air Force (USAF) human spaceflight program in the 1960s. The project was developed from early USAF concepts of crewed space stations as reconnaissance satellites, and was a successor to the canceled Boeing X-20 Dyna-Soar military reconnaissance space plane. MOL evolved into a single-use laboratory, for which crews would be launched on 30-day missions, and return to Earth using a Gemini B spacecraft derived from NASA's Gemini spacecraft.
Big Gemini was proposed to NASA by McDonnell Douglas in August 1969 as an advanced version of the Gemini spacecraft system. It was intended to provide large-capacity, all-purpose access to space, including missions that ultimately used Apollo or the Space Shuttle.
Project Gemini was NASA's second human spaceflight program. Conducted between projects Mercury and Apollo, Gemini started in 1961 and concluded in 1966. The Gemini spacecraft carried a two-astronaut crew. Ten Gemini crews and sixteen individual astronauts flew low Earth orbit (LEO) missions during 1965 and 1966.
The Mikoyan-Gurevich MiG-105, part of the Spiral program, was a crewed test vehicle to explore low-speed handling and landing. It was a visible result of a Soviet project to create an orbital spaceplane. The MiG 105 was nicknamed "Lapot" Russian: лапоть, or bast shoe, for the shape of its nose.
A reaction control system (RCS) is a spacecraft system that uses thrusters to provide attitude control, and sometimes propulsion. Use of diverted engine thrust to provide stable attitude control of a short-or-vertical takeoff and landing aircraft below conventional winged flight speeds, such as with the Harrier "jump jet", may also be referred to as a reaction control system.
The Vozvraschaemyi Apparat, or VA spacecraft, was a Soviet crew capsule, intended to serve as a crewed launch and reentry vehicle. Initially designed for the LK-1 human lunar flyby spacecraft for one of the Soviet crewed lunar programs, then the LK-700 redesign, it was later repurposed for the Almaz military space station program. The VA capsule on display at the Smithsonian National Air and Space Museum was labeled as Merkur, following a mistranslation of the original documentation – while incorrect, the name is being used in the West for the VA spacecraft and capsule.
Philip Bono was a Douglas Aircraft Company engineer. He was a pioneer of reusable vertical landing single-stage to orbit launch vehicles. As a visionary designer, he is credited with inventing the first version of a recoverable single-stage spacecraft booster, and his contributions influenced spacecraft design.
A reentry capsule is the portion of a space capsule which returns to Earth following a spaceflight. The shape is determined partly by aerodynamics; a capsule is aerodynamically stable falling blunt end first, which allows only the blunt end to require a heat shield for atmospheric entry. Its shape has also been compared to that of an old-fashioned automobile's headlight. A manned capsule contains the spacecraft's instrument panel, limited storage space, and seats for crew members. Because a capsule shape has little aerodynamic lift, the final descent is via parachute, either coming to rest on land, at sea, or by active capture by an aircraft. In contrast, the development of spaceplane reentry vehicles attempts to provide a more flexible reentry profile.
A reusable spacecraft is a class of spacecraft that have been designed with repeated launch, orbit, deorbit and atmospheric reentry in mind. This contrasts with conventional spacecraft which are designed to be expended after use. Examples of reusable spacecraft are spaceplanes and space capsules like the SpaceX Dragon. Such spacecraft need mechanisms to prevent the disintegration of the spacecraft and its occupants/cargo during reentry. Failure of such systems may be catastrophic, as what happened in the Space Shuttle Columbia disaster.
The Thor DSV-2 was a series of sounding rockets, test vehicles, and anti-satellite weapons derived from the Thor Intermediate-range ballistic missile. It was also used as the first stage of several Thor-derived expendable launch systems
SERV, short for Single-stage Earth-orbital Reusable Vehicle, was a proposed space launch system designed by Chrysler's Space Division for the Space Shuttle project. SERV was so radically different from the two-stage spaceplanes that almost every other competitor entered into the Shuttle development process that it was never seriously considered for the shuttle program.
Advanced Gemini is a number of proposals that would have extended the Gemini program by the addition of various missions, including manned low Earth orbit, circumlunar and lunar landing missions. Gemini was the second manned spaceflight program operated by NASA, and consisted of a two-seat spacecraft capable of maneuvering in orbit, docking with unmanned spacecraft such as Agena Target Vehicles, and allowing the crew to perform tethered extra-vehicular activities.
The Alpha Draco missile, also known as Weapons System 199D (WS-199D), was an experimental ballistic missile developed by McDonnell Aircraft in the late 1950s to investigate the aerodynamic physics of the boost-glide reentry trajectory. Three test flights were conducted in 1959, of which two were successful.
Boost-glide trajectories are a class of spacecraft guidance and reentry trajectories that extend the range of suborbital spaceplanes and reentry vehicles by employing aerodynamic lift in the high upper atmosphere. In most examples, boost-glide roughly doubles the range over the purely ballistic trajectory. In others, a series of skips allows range to be further extended, and leads to the alternate terms skip-glide and skip reentry.
