The Mississippi Test Facility would be responsible for testing and proving the space shuttle engines. On March 1, 1971, the announcement finally was made. One outside study of the sites vying for the test assignment gave the Mississippi Test Facility nine “value points,” twice as many as any other site. Mississippi Test Facility leaders made a case for using their site for the testing, and others reinforced the idea. But besides the Mississippi Test Facility, two other sites around the country also were vying to test the new engine. That meant additional testing would be needed on a new type of engine. However, another American space program already was in the works – development of a reusable flight vehicle that would come to be known as the space shuttle. Many believed they never would be used again. With the last test firing on the next-to-last day of October 1970, the test stands at Stennis grew quiet. In other words, the engineers and workers at the Mississippi Test Facility knew how to do their jobs and they did them well. Along the way, there never was a test delayed due to lack of support services. It was a team that had succeeded beyond all expectations, performing 43 test firings with only five aborts and accumulating a total of 2,475 man-years of rocket test experience. It was a team that had shouldered a great responsibility in the nation’s fledgling space program – testing and proving the rockets that would carry America’s astronauts, as well as the country’s hopes and dreams, to the moon. From the ground up, against the toughest of conditions and deadlines, that team built a test site in amazing fashion out of woodland and swamp. A little more than four years later – Octo– the last Saturn booster test was conducted at the site.ĭuring those brief years, Mississippi Test Facility leaders had assembled a tremendous team of engineers and workers. Engineers had conducted the first test of a Saturn booster on April 23, 1966. The Mississippi site was less than a decade old, having been built in a rush of activity to test the massive Saturn booster rockets that were used in the Apollo Program. Marshall Space Flight Center in Huntsville, Ala. It was not an independent NASA center but operated under the guidance of the George C. Stennis Space Center hung in the balance.Īt the time, the site was called the Mississippi Test Facility. As the Apollo Program that carried humans to the moon and back began to wind down in the early 1970s, the fate of what now is known as NASA’s John C.
0 Comments
Leave a Reply. |
AuthorWrite something about yourself. No need to be fancy, just an overview. ArchivesCategories |