Space Shuttle Program

Key facts

Mission & specifications

Mission

The Space Shuttle was the world's first reusable crewed spacecraft, and for thirty years it was the face of American spaceflight. Conceived as a 'space truck' that would fly to orbit and back like an aeroplane, it was a unique machine: a winged orbiter the size of an airliner, launched upright bolted to a giant external fuel tank and two solid rocket boosters, that re-entered as a glider and landed on a runway. Five spaceworthy orbiters flew — Columbia, Challenger, Discovery, Atlantis and Endeavour — beginning with Columbia's maiden flight in April 1981 and ending with Atlantis on the program's 135th mission in July 2011. Across those three decades the Shuttle did things no other vehicle could. It carried satellites, laboratories and the components of two space stations in its cavernous payload bay. It launched the Hubble Space Telescope in 1990 and then flew five servicing missions that repaired its flawed mirror and kept it at the cutting edge for decades — possible only because astronauts could reach it, work on it, and fly home. Above all, it built the International Space Station, lofting the massive modules and trusses that robotic rockets could not. But the Shuttle never became the cheap, routine 'truck' its designers promised. It was complex, costly and dangerous: a launch system with no crew escape during the most critical phases, and fragile thermal protection that had to survive both ascent and the inferno of re-entry. Twice that fragility proved fatal — Challenger in 1986 and Columbia in 2003 — and fourteen astronauts died. When Atlantis rolled to a stop in 2011, the United States was left without its own way to launch astronauts until SpaceX's Crew Dragon flew in 2020. The Shuttle's legacy is double-edged: an engineering marvel that expanded what humans could do in orbit, and a sobering lesson in the true cost and risk of spaceflight.

1. 1981The first Shuttle fliesLaunch

   Columbia reaches orbit on STS-1, the first flight of a reusable crewed spacecraft.

2. 1986Challenger is lostMilestone

   STS-51-L breaks apart 73 seconds after launch; the fleet is grounded for 32 months.

3. 1990Hubble launchedDeployment

   The Shuttle carries the Hubble Space Telescope to orbit; later crews repair and upgrade it.

4. 1998Building the ISSMilestone

   The Shuttle begins assembling the International Space Station, lofting modules no other rocket could.

5. 2003Columbia is lostMilestone

   STS-107 breaks apart on re-entry; the accident board questions the program's future.

6. 2011The final landingMission end

   Atlantis lands on STS-135, ending 30 years and 135 missions.

Images

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