After the last landing, which took place in 2011 space shuttler will rise to its 20 floors again, although this time it won’t take off. It will be assembled outside of a NASA facility for the first time as part of an exhibition in Samuel Oschin Aerospace Centerwhose inauguration will take place July 20.
It is not the first time Endeavor takes part in the exhibition. In fact, so far he has remained unprotected in California Science Center. And yet he lay. Raising a rocket to such a height is not easy, especially if it is not located in a facility specially equipped for this, and especially if the task is not to then launch it into space. Regardless, the Samuel Oschin Center wants to open in style. Literally.
Were 20 years which shuttle was active. He certainly deserves a good pension. But as a good star in space exploration, in retirement he will be able to be admired by all those who want to see up close what this craft was like that catapulted some of the most important missions in the history of space into the sky.
Birth of Endeavor
After the tragic accident of the Challenger in 1986, which ended in the death of its entire crew, NASA was faced with the need to build new space shuttle. Obviously, the biggest loss was the seven human lives that died shortly after launch. However, the space agency was also left without a vehicle for its space missions.
Initially, it was supposed to reform the Enterprise, but it was not economically feasible. For this reason, Endeavor was planned in 1987. It was first released in 1992. and operated until 2011, completing a total of 25 missions, including, deployment of 3 satellites, docking of one to the Russian MIR station and 12 dockings to the International Space Station. He even accompanied Hubble on his first trip from Earth to space.
The first of his missions was just the deployment of a communications satellite immediately after its capture: Intelsat VI. Shortly thereafter, in September 1992, he took an African-American woman, an astronaut, into space for the first time. May Jemison. Endeavor has had many milestones, but now it’s time to take a break. Although for this he is once again erected into an attractive exhibition.
Complex Assembly
The assembly centers of NASA, as well as other space agencies, are equipped with everything necessary to create spacecraft of all types and prepare them for launch. However, since the Endeavor will no longer leave our planet, the assembly of its parts this time it will not happen in a space object.
Mounting it horizontally, as they did in California, is relatively easy, but this time they want to go even further. The process will be as follows:
Will be installed first strict skirts, which are a pair of skirt-shaped segments located at the base of the rocket’s solid rocket boosters. They will then post engines and then they will pile on them external tank. Finally it’s the turn orbiter and everything would be ready. These last steps are done with a crane to get to the top. And that’s what Endeavor generally measures 61 meters high.
Date of issue
Fans of Endeavor will be able to see it up close as if it were ready to launch starting from July 20. According to the communications agency responsible for announcing the exhibition, this date was chosen because Cosmonautics Day. However, there is some controversy with this date.
And the fact is that the day chosen by the United Nations as the International Day of manned space flights and, accordingly, space exploration is April 12. It was on this day in 1961 that the Russian Yuri Gagarin He starred in the first space flight with a man on board.
However, in the United States, Space Exploration Day is celebrated on July 20, since it was then in 1969 that the American astronaut Neil Armstrong He became the first man to walk on the moon.
This will be the day Endeavor opens. Not to mention when Cosmonautics Day should be celebrated, it is clear that both Gagarin and Armstrong were two great achievements that laid the foundation for solid space race, full of men and women from different countries and cultures, who managed to transport a person to unimaginable worlds. That’s what we should be celebrating.
Source: Hiper Textual
