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Established | 2009 |
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Location | 12400 Columbia Way Downey, California, US |
Coordinates | 33°55′11″N118°08′01″W / 33.91984°N 118.13362°W |
Type | Science Museum |
Key holdings | Space Shuttle Inspiration |
Visitors | 30,000 (in 2013) [1] |
Website | Official website |
The Columbia Memorial Space Center (CMSC) is a science museum in the Los Angeles area, in City of Downey, California, US. It is owned and operated by Downey, and open to the general public as a hands-on space museum and activity center. [2]
The center's stated mission is to "ignite people's passion in science, technology, engineering, and space while honoring Downey's aerospace history." [2]
The site of the museum is the former Boeing/Rockwell/North American plant where all of the Apollo Command/Service Modules were built and the Space Shuttle was conceived. In 1999, when the Downey Plant closed, the City of Downey began a redevelopment effort, including an educational component. In early 2007, a builder — Tower General Contractors — was selected, and ground was broken on April 12, 2007, on the 18,000 square foot project. [3]
First opened in 2008, CMSC is recognized as the National Memorial to the Space Shuttle Columbia and its crew that was lost on STS-107. [4] [5]
On November 7, 2008, a propane tank exploded during the filming of an episode of the television series Bones , causing an electrical fire, without damage to the museum. [6]
Designated a Challenger Learning Center, [7] the museum has a variety of camps, workshops, and other monthly events to generate interest in STEM, and hands-on exhibits. Now 20,000 square feet, the two-story building has a robotics lab, HD computer lab, and a wide range of interactive exhibits on Space Shuttle operations, living and working on the International Space Station, exploration of the Solar System, aerospace engineering, and the range of fields of study and jobs related to human and robotic space exploration. [2]
In 2012, the first "Space Shuttle" – a wood and plastic full-scale mockup built by North American Rockwell in 1972 – was placed on temporary display at the center. [8] Dubbed the "Space Shuttle Inspiration", it was disassembled and stored in early 2014. [9]
In front of the center, a dummy "boilerplate" Apollo command capsule, BP-12, is on display. This was the first Apollo capsule to fly, [10] and is now owned by the City of Downey. [11] The center also owns Apollo Boilerplate BP-19A, [12] which is in storage as of 2018.
Space Shuttle Columbia (OV-102) was a Space Shuttle orbiter manufactured by Rockwell International and operated by NASA. Named after the first American ship to circumnavigate the globe, and the female personification of the United States, Columbia was the first of five Space Shuttle orbiters to fly in space, debuting the Space Shuttle launch vehicle on its maiden flight on April 12, 1981 and becoming the first ever spacecraft to be re-used after its first flight when it launched on STS-2 on November 12, 1981. As only the second full-scale orbiter to be manufactured after the Approach and Landing Test vehicle Enterprise, Columbia retained unique external and internal features compared to later orbiters, such as test instrumentation and distinctive black chines. In addition to a heavier aft fuselage and the retention of an internal airlock throughout its lifetime, these made Columbia the heaviest of the five spacefaring orbiters; around 1,000 kilograms heavier than Challenger and 3,600 kilograms heavier than Endeavour when originally constructed. Columbia also carried ejection seats based on those from the SR-71 during its first six flights until 1983, and from 1986 onwards carried an imaging pod on its vertical stabilizer.
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The Space Shuttle program was the fourth human spaceflight program carried out by the U.S. National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA), which accomplished routine transportation for Earth-to-orbit crew and cargo from 1981 to 2011. 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, as a proposed nuclear shuttle in the plan was cancelled in 1972. It flew 135 missions and carried 355 astronauts from 16 countries, many on multiple trips.
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