Like today, ten years ago today, the Space Shuttle Atlantis landed on Earth for the last time, signaling the end of an era for the United States space agency – NASA. The historic orbiter that was synonymous with space travel was finally retired.
Without any other means of sending American astronauts into space, NASA turned to Russia to safely send its astronauts to the International Space Station and bring them back to Earth. This partnership flourished for nearly a decade until NASA came up with a new plan: to engage trading companies to build spacecraft capable of transporting its astronauts.
In this new era of space travel, NASA would no longer build vehicles, but would instead book private spacecraft travel, reports aljazeera.
To that end, in 2014, the U.S. space agency selected two different companies to build its future space taxis – Elon Musk SpaceX and aircraft manufacturer Boeing. Both have built the legacy of the ship’s program, Telegrafi reports.
Ten years after his last war, here is a look back at how the ship helped shape our ideas for humans in space by some of the astronauts it carried.
NASA work
NASA launched its spacecraft after the glory days of the Apollo era. A magnificent car, the winged ship – which was launched like a rocket and landed like an airplane – was capable of flying many times.
In total, NASA sent five of these spacecraft into space: Atlantis, Challenger, Columbia, Discovery, and Endeavor (a sixth spacecraft, the Enterprise, conducted flight tests but never made it beyond Earth’s atmosphere). The “fab five” orbital fleet flew for three decades, changing the way it entered space.
During that time, the International Space Station was built, astronauts became more than just military pilots, and many important satellites were launched, including the historic Hubble Space Telescope.
“The spacecraft was truly one of the most unique vehicles ever built,” Chris Ferguson, a former NASA astronaut who commanded the spacecraft’s last mission, told Al Jazeera.
“Having the opportunity to stand next to a spaceship is very special,” added Ferguson, now a Boeing astronaut. “It is essential for the country and the world to be able to see the things we can do when we set our minds on it,” he said.
Spaceships flew 135 missions, but were too costly to launch and maintain. In contrast, modern-day commercial crew vehicles are the most efficient man-made spacecraft NASA has earned, receiving less than $ 7 billion for two different spacecraft systems, according to a space agency data analysis. American by the non-profit Planetary Society.
By comparison, the spacecraft cost more than $ 27 billion to develop (second only to Apollo) and the spacecraft were not without risk, as evidenced by the loss of Challenger and Columbia in 1986 and 2003.
NASA decided to embark on a new path, sending its fleet of space emitters across the country to inspire the next generation of rocket engineers and scientists.
Increasing commercial space travel
Before the ship’s wheels were touched during this final mission in 2011, NASA knew it was headed in a different direction.
Elon Musk founded SpaceX in 2002 with the goal of eventually launching humans into space. And Boeing was already a major player in the aerospace industry.
In 2014, NASA awarded Boeing a $ 4.2 billion contract and SpaceX a $ 2.6 billion contract to begin a search to build NASA’s future space taxis.
To that end, NASA selected a crew of its astronauts to work directly with SpaceX and Boeing and lend their expertise to build the best vehicles possible.
Ferguson joined Boeing after leaving the astronauts’ office and becoming the first private astronaut. He helped design the Starliner spacecraft, which will embark on its second unclean mission later this month.
During the 10-day mission, the spacecraft will fly to the International Space Station, anchor and then return home. The company initially launched its Starliner spacecraft in December 2019, but failed to reach the space station as the vehicle experienced an anomaly during flight.
SpaceX, which built its Crew Dragon capsule, has launched three astronaut missions to date. The company became the first private space flight company to launch humans into orbit, returning human flights to U.S. soil for the first time since 2011.
That flight, called Demo-2, exploded from the Kennedy Space Center in Florida on May 30, 2020. Inside were two NASA astronauts: Bob Behnken and Doug Hurley. The pair tested the vehicle system in flight, even manually checking the ship as it was leaving for the International Space Station.
After a two-month stay in orbit, the two astronauts returned to Earth, crashing into the Gulf Coast for the first time since the Apollo program.
Their mission was a huge success and proved that NASA’s commercial partners had what it took to start sending astronauts regularly. The first operational flight was ordered for November 2020 and included the first international partner – Japan.
The Japanese astronaut Soichi Noguchi of the Japanese Space Agency was soon joined by two other international partners: Akihiko Hoshide from Japan and Thomas Pesquet of the European Space Agency, the Telegraph reports.
These two astronauts, along with NASA’s Megan McArthur and Shane Kimbrough, make up the Crew-2 group of astronauts that most recently launched to the space station in April 2021.
Jan Worner, former director general of the European Space Agency, expressed ESA’s confidence in both SpaceX and NASA’s crew program as a whole.
ESA has reserved seats for its astronauts on the next two flights, including the Crew-3 mission that SpaceX is planning to launch in October.
Once Boeing successfully completes its second orbital flight test, the company will launch its first crew. This flight, called CFT-1, is scheduled to start later this year.
The pursuit of dreams
Sandy Magnus, a former NASA astronaut who also flew on the spacecraft’s last mission, told Al Jazeera that the current vehicles being launched into space are part of the legacy of the spacecraft program.
“You can see the boats in the museum and then look at the vehicles that they helped really inspire people to leave,” Magnus said.
Nicole Stott, a former NASA astronaut who flew the spacecraft, says she hopes one day one of NASA’s commercial partners will build a spacecraft more similar to the spacecraft.
That’s because there were skills no other craft has now, including the ability to serve satellites in orbit, such as the Hubble Space Telescope.
“The ship was really special and had some unique capabilities,” Stott told Al Jazeera. “I would like to see a winged orbiter flying one day into the future,” he added.
Fortunately for Stott, there is a company out there that is working on a space plane design. Sierra Nevada Corporation is building a miniature version of the spacecraft called the Dream Chaser.
This pending commercial space company has broken a lucrative NASA contract that will help send more cargo to the International Space Station.
NASA opened the second round of commercial merchandise contracts in 2016, ultimately selecting three companies to deliver the merchandise: SpaceX, Northrop Grumman and Sierra Nevada. Each company will be paid to deliver a certain number of cargo missions to the space station.
Both SpaceX and Northrop have already started handing over their deal while Dream Chaser is still trying to get off the ground.
Similar to the spacecraft that inspired its model, the Dream Chaser will launch a rocket – in this case a United Launch Alliance Atlas V or Vulcan Centaur – and land like a plane on a runway at the Kennedy Space Center.
Dream Chaser will allow some quest to be tracked quickly on Earth instead of waiting for a trip home with a Dragon. If all goes according to plan, the first launch could take place sometime next year.