Now in the twilight of the Space Transport System, OPF 1 and 2 hold Atlantis and Discovery. These three buildings represent the Orbiter Processing Facilities (OPF) 1, 2, and 3 and have been the hangers for all five orbiters over their 30 year operational life. ![]() ![]() Closer scrutiny shows that each of the three building have large garage-style doors on one face with a distinct vertical opening for the passage of a tall aircraft tail. Standing in the shadow of the 526-ft tall Vehicle Assembly Building (VAB) are three tan colored nondescript square shaped buildings that could easily be disregarded as bland unimportant government buildings. My final STS mission was to preserve the sight on the flight deck for history.Īs much time as the orbiters have spent in space, they have spent even more time on Earth being prepared for their missions. This view would not be complete without a final visit to a “live” orbiter to document the scene with my own eyes and camera. Reflecting on those humble beginnings, I could not help reminisce that 30 years later I had been physically present at the launch site for the last decade of missions and had the privilege of an up-close detailed view of the program. As a young child of a Sri Lankan engineer attached to the UN, this was my introduction to the STS program when the astronauts visited and passed out their autographed official pictures. NASA sent astronauts out to the distant relay stations to act as ambassadors prior to the missions. The relay tracking station, one of many around the world, was tasked with keeping the data link with the orbiters when they were overhead. If I were to trace my history with the STS program, it extends back to the US tracking station in Seychelles in 1981 and the launch of the first shuttle mission. My journey to the flight deck of Atlantis and the appreciation of that experience is the product of my life’s twists and turns too. A “live” orbiter is a sight that even astronauts admit relegates their training mockups and simulators (which they spend all their terrestrial training time on) to a lower place on their scale of cool experiences. This is unfortunate as to truly appreciate the engineering marvel that a space shuttle orbiter is, one must see her come alive on the flight deck just as the astronauts would see her in orbit. This number is further reduced when it is a powered orbiter. While millions of people around the globe have witnessed the spectacle of the 17,500+ mph orbiters at 150+ miles of altitude or an orbiter climbing gracefully atop a fiery long flame and white smoke trail on launch day, very few have actually been inside. Even her detractors had to admit to the utility of the feats performed by the STS program and the engineering accomplishments embodied by the program. However, at the end of 30 years of operations, the STS program had accomplished a spectacular number of feats such as having successfully journeyed 133 times into Space, carried 355 individual astronauts aboard the five orbiters, deployed many satellites, including Hubble and Chandra and helped build a new Space Station. ![]() ![]() Somewhere along the line, the reality of budget limitations, politics and the laws of science intersected to produce a program that only once reached a high of 10 missions a year. It was meant to be a utility truck that flew 40-50 missions a year. The Space Transport System, better known as the Space Shuttle, was built to give ubiquitous access to low Earth orbit. The following is a special submission to NYCAviation from Space Columnist Suresh Atapattu of Florida Skies.
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