It took up the first American component of the station, a Unity node, which is a passageway that connects the working and living modules. The Endeavour, he added, “more or less saved Hubble and helped give it the legacy it has today.” The International Space Stationĭue to the Endeavour, the International Space Station’s birth is noted as December 1998. “Without that mission, Hubble would be rather useless in orbit,” said space history expert Robert Pearlman. In 1993, the Endeavour launched the first Hubble servicing mission to fix the problem. In April 1990, shortly after the launch of the Hubble, scientists noticed that the images it sent back were blurry. To continue with NASA’s space program involvement with the school children, educational videos were filmed to compare Cook’s first voyage on his Endeavour with NASA’s.Ī marvelous achievement was the mission that serviced the Hubble Space Telescope. Medical tests assessing the human body’s performance in microgravity was also an important part of its mission. It also partook in rescue attempts and an unprecedented three-person spacewalk. The Endeavour program began flight operations in 1992 with the Intelsat VI repair mission. You might also like: Star Wars Galaxy's Edge, The Best of a Galaxy Far, Far Away Consequently, it also enabled them to use that as a unit of measurement in calculating the parameters of the universe. This, of course, showed how important it was to include scientists on voyages with his crew of 93 men, 11 scientists, and artists. Which allowed his crew to be able to find the distance of the Sun from the Earth. Back in 1768, Cook sailed into the South Pacific to observe the passage of Venus between the Earth and the Sun. The Endeavour program gets its name from the first ship commanded by 18th century British explorer James Cook. The only proviso was that the name had to be based on a historic oceangoing research or exploration vessel. But who was to name the new space shuttle? It was part of a national competition held by NASA in 1988 for elementary and secondary school students. But that’s just a small part of its history, let me tell you some of the incredible space shuttle facts about the Endeavour.Īfter the tragic demise of the Challenger, a fifth Space Shuttle orbiter was authorized to be built as a replacement in 1987. While also traveling around the Earth more than 4,600 times. Over 19 years, the Endeavour program logged nearly 123 million miles (198 million kilometers). However, now that I have, I was awestruck! These space shuttle pictures I took really don’t do it justice, which is exactly why you have to go see it for yourself! Having flown its final mission in 2011, this NASA space shuttle is now part of the California Science Center. I’m appalled it took me so long to go see it as it’s in my own backyard. About $360 million of the $400 million cost has been raised.As I’m a fan of sci-fi worlds like that of Doctor Who, it should be no surprise that I’m also a fan of real science, such as the Space Shuttle Endeavour in LA. In addition to completing the building, about 100 other aircraft and spacecraft will be installed along with numerous interpretive exhibits, Rudolph said. The 116-foot-long (35.3-meter-long) rocket motors were trucked to Los Angeles from the Mojave Desert in October and installed the following month. In use, the boosters would be attached to the external tank to help the shuttle’s main engines lift off. It began in July with precise installation of the bottom segments of the side boosters, known as aft skirts, for the first time outside of a NASA facility. The process of assembling the shuttle system in vertical configuration was dubbed “Go for Stack,” an informal term for putting together rocket components for launch. A groundbreaking ceremony for the Air and Space Center was held in 2022 on the 11th anniversary of Endeavour’s final return from space.
The shuttle was initially displayed horizontally in a temporary exhibit hall. The external tank arrived by barge and made a similar trip across the city. The shuttle was flown to Los Angeles International Airport in 2012 atop a NASA Boeing 747 and then created a spectacle as it was inched through tight city streets to Exposition Park. Endeavour flew 25 missions between 19, when NASA’s shuttle program ended.