BOB EDWARDS
On Friday, Sept. 17, 1976, the Space Shuttle program introduced the Space Shuttle Enterprise, its first orbiter. The shuttle was designed to perform atmospheric test flights and was built without engines or a working heat shield, so it wasn't fit...
Bush announced that the space shuttle program would be shut down once the International Space Station was completed in 2010 (in fact, it took another year). In preparation NASA invited companies to help supply the station. By this point NASA's HL-20 was mostly forgotten and gathering dust ...
We also saw the launch pads that have been used for the Apollo moon missions and the Space Shuttle program. It was fascinating. The Apollo and Saturn V rocket display was very interesting. There are some terrific explanatory displays and films. it was gr...
"These things have a brand new state-of-the-art controller that is a fraction of the cost of the controllers we used during the space shuttle program," he said. "We also have to put them through the paces with the environments that will see on the SLS." ...
Once the space shuttle program ended in 2011, NASA has had one option to get to the space station: hitch a ride with the Russians. A round-trip ticket on a Soyuz rocket costs $81 million per seat. That is now changing. NASA has hired two companies – SpaceX and Boeing – to design...
The NASA OIG is recommending that NASA conduct a review of the Space Launch System product and try to get a handle on why the costs keep soaring and the rocket keeps not soaring. The underlying cause is that the contract for the SLS is cost plus, with NASA agreeing to p...
Why did NASA stop using space shuttles? There are multiple reasons for the cessation of the space shuttle program. These included cost, the desire to create new means of space travel, and past safety disasters. Another cause was the declaration of President George W. Bush in 2004 that the ...
The shuttle carried large parts into space to build the International Space Station. The space shuttle was also like a science lab. Astronauts did experiments there. Doing experiments in space is different than doing them on Earth. By 2010, it is reported that the project cost US$209 billion...
Elizabeth Howell, Ph.D., is a staff writer in the spaceflight channel since 2022. She was contributing writer forSpace.comfor 10 years before that, since 2012. Elizabeth's on-site reporting includes two human spaceflight launches from Kazakhstan, three space shuttle missions in Florida, and embe...