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82-514: The idea of using a rocket to remove the capsule from a space vehicle was developed by Maxime Faget in 1958. The system, using the tower on the top of the space capsule to house rockets, was first used on a test of the Project Mercury capsule in March 1959. Historically, LES were used on American Mercury and Apollo spacecraft. Both designs used a solid-fuel rocket motor. The Mercury LES

164-588: A Bachelor of Science degree in mechanical engineering from Louisiana State University in 1943. After three years as a submariner aboard USS  Guavina in the U.S. Navy , Faget joined the Langley Research Center in Hampton, Virginia as a research scientist. While working for NACA at Langley, he worked on the design of the X-15 hypersonic spacecraft. In 1958, Faget became one of

246-484: A 200-foot (61 m) evacuation tube running from the Mobile Launcher platform to a blast-resistant bunker 39 feet (12 m) underground, nicknamed Rubber room , equipped with survival supplies for 20 persons for 24 hours and reachable through a high-speed elevator. A further Emergency Egress System was installed to allow fast escape of crew or technicians from pad in case of imminent catastrophic failure of

328-500: A bid for shared non-exclusive use of the complex, so that the launchpad would handle multiple vehicles, and costs could be shared over the long-term. One potential shared user in the Blue Origin plan was United Launch Alliance . Prior to the end of the bid period, and prior to any public announcement by NASA of the results of the process, Blue Origin filed a protest with the U.S. General Accounting Office (GAO) "over what it says

410-570: A booster rocket separation failure occurred at an altitude of 50 km during the ascent. However, at this point in the mission the LES had already been ejected and was not used to separate the crew capsule from the rest of the launch vehicle. Backup motors were used to separate the crew capsule resulting in the crew landing safely and uninjured approximately 19 minutes after launch. On September 12, 2022 during Blue Origin New Shepard flight NS-23 ,

492-416: A curtain of water sprayed across it for protection from flames. The launch complex was equipped with a slidewire escape basket system for quick evacuation. Assisted by members of the closeout team, the crew would leave the orbiter and ride an emergency basket to the ground at speeds reaching up to 55 miles per hour (89 km/h). From there, the crew took shelter in a bunker. The pad fire station operated

574-481: A fleet of four modified M113A2 Firefighting Vehicles , a variant of the M113 APC. Painted in a neon green rescue livery, these vehicles provided viable transportation to rescue personnel and firefighters should they need to approach the pad during a launch emergency. They could also be used to safely evacuate astronauts and crew from the vicinity of the pad. During launches, two manned APCs would be stationed less than

656-580: A launch abort scenario. Although often referred to as a "pusher" arrangement since it lacks a tower, the Dragon 2 LAS removes both the capsule and its trunk together from the launch vehicle. The system is designed to abort with the SuperDraco engines at the top of the abort stack as occurs with a more traditional tractor LAS. The concept was first tested in a Pad Abort test conducted at SLC-40 , Cape Canaveral Air Force Station , on May 6, 2015. SpaceX tested

738-480: A launch, it deflected the launch vehicle's rocket exhaust flame into a trench measuring 43 feet (13 m) deep by 59 feet (18 m) wide by 449 feet (137 m) long. The four-story Launch Control Center (LCC) was located 3.5 miles (5.6 km) away from Pad A, adjacent to the Vehicle Assembly Building, for safety. The third floor had four firing rooms (corresponding to the four bays in

820-464: A mile from the launch pad (holding firefighters at-the-ready), one unmanned would be stationed on the pad (for extra evacuation capacity), and the fourth provided a backup at the fire station. During the launch of Discovery on STS-124 on May 31, 2008, the pad at LC-39A suffered extensive damage, in particular to the concrete trench used to deflect the SRB's flames. The subsequent investigation found that

902-501: A pad worker. During the attempted launch, the booster switched from external to internal power as it normally would do, which then activated the abort sensing system. Originally it was thought that the LES firing was triggered by a gantry arm that tilted the rocket past 7 degrees, meeting one of the defined in-flight abort conditions. The first usage with a crewed mission occurred during the attempt to launch Soyuz T-10-1 on September 26, 1983. The rocket caught fire, just before launch, and

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984-475: A parking position shortly before launch. While the ML was sat on its launch pedestals, one of two flame deflectors was slid on rails into place under it. Having two deflectors allowed for one to be used while the other was being refurbished after a previous launch. Each deflector measured 39 feet (12 m) high by 49 feet (15 m) wide by 75 feet (23 m) long, and weighed 1,400,000 pounds (635 t). During

1066-636: A payload transportation canister and then installed vertically at the Payload Changeout Room. Otherwise, payloads would have already been pre-installed at the Orbiter Processing Facility and transported within the orbiter's cargo bay. The original structure of the pads was remodeled for the needs of the Space Shuttle, starting with Pad 39A after the last Saturn V launch, and, in 1977, that of Pad 39B after

1148-469: A short distance north at Cochran Cove. Continuing straight north-northeast would have led to C after a similar northward bend. The original construction of the Crawlerway included an interchange between B and a short part of the extension northward for C, which remains intact as of 2022 , and the traffic-light warning system for the Crawlerway has lights for Pad C. The plans still set aside room for

1230-411: A two-story, 161-by-135-foot (49 by 41 m) launcher platform with four hold-down arms and a 446-foot (136 m) Launch Umbilical Tower (LUT) topped by a crane used to lift the spacecraft elements into position for assembly. The ML and unfueled vehicle together weighed 12,600,000 pounds (5,715 t). The umbilical tower contained two elevators and nine retractable swing arms that were extended to

1312-452: Is a plan by NASA to award an exclusive commercial lease to SpaceX for use of mothballed space shuttle launch pad 39A." NASA had planned to complete the bid award and have the pad transferred by October 1, 2013, but the protest "will delay any decision until the GAO reaches a decision, expected by mid-December." On December 12, 2013, the GAO denied the protest and sided with NASA, which argued that

1394-522: Is currently prepared for the Artemis program , which was first launched in November 2022. A pad to be designated 39C, which would have been a copy of pads 39A and 39B, was originally planned for Apollo but never built. A smaller pad, also designated 39C, was constructed from January to June 2015, to accommodate small-lift launch vehicles . NASA launches from pads 39A and 39B have been supervised from

1476-614: The Space Shuttle Columbia . After Apollo 10, Pad 39B was kept as a backup launch facility in the case of the destruction of 39A, but saw active service during all three Skylab missions, the Apollo–Soyuz test flight, and a contingency Skylab Rescue flight that never became necessary. After the Apollo–Soyuz Test Project, 39B was reconfigured similarly to 39A; but due to additional modifications (mainly to allow

1558-570: The Apollo program 's "Moonport" and later modified for the Space Shuttle program . Launch Complex 39 consists of three launch sub-complexes or "pads"— 39A , 39B , and 39C—a Vehicle Assembly Building (VAB), a Crawlerway used by crawler-transporters to carry mobile launcher platforms between the VAB and the pads, Orbiter Processing Facility buildings, a Launch Control Center which contains

1640-683: The Apollo–Soyuz in 1975. The first usage of the pad for the Space Shuttle came in 1979, when Enterprise was used to check the facilities prior to the first operational launch. Each pad contained a two-piece access tower system, the Fixed Service Structure (FSS) and the Rotating Service Structure (RSS). The FSS permitted access to the Shuttle via a retractable arm and a "beanie cap" to capture vented LOX from

1722-521: The Gemini and Apollo vehicles, which shared many design points with the Mercury. Faget filed a patent for a space shuttle vehicle design in 1972. His design, which he named " DC-3 " in homage to the famed Douglas DC-3 airliner, was a small two-stage fully reusable shuttle with a payload capacity around 15,000 pounds (6,800 kg). DC-3 was officially studied by North American Aviation and shown in

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1804-539: The Zond program and the TKS program . All of its flights were uncrewed. The Space Shuttle was fitted with ejection seats for the two pilots in the initial test flights, but these were removed once the vehicle was deemed operational and carried additional crew members, which could not be provided with escape hatches. Following the 1986 Challenger disaster , all surviving orbiters were fitted to allow for crew evacuation through

1886-623: The retirement of the Shuttle fleet in July 2011. Prior to the SpaceX lease agreement, the pad remained as it was when Atlantis launched on the final shuttle mission on July 8, 2011, complete with a mobile launcher platform . With the retirement of the Space Shuttle in 2011, and the cancellation of Constellation Program in 2010, the future of the Launch Complex 39 pads was uncertain. By early 2011, NASA began informal discussions on use of

1968-580: The 1950s. After the creation of NASA in 1958, the CCAFS launch pads were used for NASA's civilian uncrewed and crewed launches, including those of Project Mercury and Project Gemini . In 1961, President Kennedy proposed to Congress the goal of landing a man on the Moon by the end of the decade. Congressional approval led to the launch of the Apollo program , which required a massive expansion of NASA operations, including an expansion of launch operations from

2050-564: The 35 engineers who formed the Space Task Group , creating the Mercury spacecraft. He based his designs on the aerodynamic work of Harvey Allen from the mid-1950s, and was instrumental in selecting the blunt-body shape that won the Mercury competition over numerous contenders. He led the development of the escape tower system used on Mercury, which was used in various forms on almost all following crewed spacecraft. He also worked on

2132-535: The Cape to adjacent Merritt Island to the north and west. NASA began acquisition of land in 1962, taking title to 131 square miles (340 km ) by outright purchase and negotiating with the state of Florida for an additional 87 square miles (230 km ). On July 1, 1962, the site was named the Launch Operations Center . The need for a new launch complex was first considered in 1961. At the time,

2214-553: The Constellation program was cancelled. By early 2013, NASA publicly announced that it would allow commercial launch providers to lease LC-39A, and followed that, in May 2013, with a formal solicitation for proposals for commercial use of the pad. There were two competing bids for the commercial use of the launch complex. SpaceX submitted a bid for exclusive use of the launch complex, while Jeff Bezos ' Blue Origin submitted

2296-591: The External Tank was being fueled, hazardous gas was vented from an internal hydrogen tank, through the GUCP, and out a vent line to a flare stack where it was burned off at a safe distance. Sensors at the GUCP measured gas level. The GUCP was redesigned after leaks created scrubs of STS-127 and were also detected during attempts to launch STS-119 and STS-133 . The GUCP released from the ET at launch and fell away with

2378-615: The Falcon 9's failure investigation and its return to flight. In early 2016, considering the busy Falcon 9 launch manifest, it became unclear if the Falcon Heavy would be the first vehicle to launch from Pad 39A, or if one or more Falcon 9 missions would precede a Falcon Heavy launch. In the following months, the Falcon Heavy launch was delayed multiple times and eventually pushed back to February 2018. In 2018, SpaceX made further modifications to LC 39A to prepare it to accommodate it for

2460-628: The LAS it was building for the Orion spacecraft to future commercial crew vehicle providers in the wake of the cancellation of the Constellation project. During the Mercury-Redstone 1 mission on November 21, 1960, the escape system unintentionally blasted off from the Mercury spacecraft after the Redstone booster engine shut down just after ignition on the pad. The spacecraft remained attached to

2542-424: The LES carried the crew capsule clear, seconds before the rocket exploded. The crew were subjected to an acceleration of 14 to 17 g (140 to 170 m/s) for five seconds and were badly bruised. Reportedly, the capsule reached an altitude of 2,000 meters (6,600 ft) and landed 4 kilometers (2.5 mi) from the launch pad. On October 11, 2018 the crew of Soyuz MS-10 separated from their launch vehicle after

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2624-442: The ML was set in place, the crawler-transporter rolled a 410-foot (125 m), 10,490,000-pound (4,760 t) Mobile Service Structure (MSS) into place to provide further access for technicians to perform a detailed checkout of the vehicle, and to provide necessary umbilical connections to the pad. The MSS contained three elevators, two self-propelled platforms, and three fixed platforms. It was rolled back 6,900 feet (2,100 m) to

2706-556: The NASA Launch Control Center (LCC), located 3 miles (4.8 km) from the launch pads. LC-39 is one of several launch sites that share the radar and tracking services of the Eastern Test Range . Northern Merritt Island was first developed around 1890 when a few wealthy Harvard University graduates purchased 18,000 acres (73 km ) and constructed a three-story mahogany clubhouse, very nearly on

2788-732: The Soviet Buran -class spaceplanes would also have made use of them if they had ever flown with crews. As shown by Soyuz T-10a , a LES must be able to carry a crew compartment from the launch pad to a height sufficient for its parachutes to open. Consequently, they must make use of large, powerful (and heavy) solid rockets . The Soyuz launch escape system is called CAC or SAS , from the Russian/ transliterated Russian Система Аварийного Спасения or Sistema Avariynogo Spaseniya , meaning emergency rescue system. The Soviet Proton launcher has flown dozens of times with an escape tower, under

2870-615: The Space Shuttle to achieve orbit was provided by a combination of the Solid Rocket Boosters (SRBs) and the RS-25 engines. The SRBs used solid propellant, hence their name. The RS-25 engines used a combination of liquid hydrogen and liquid oxygen (LOX) from the external tank  (ET), as the orbiter did not have room for internal fuel tanks. The SRBs arrived in segments via rail car from their manufacturing facility in Utah ,

2952-582: The VAB), each with 470 sets of control and monitoring equipment. The second floor contained telemetry, tracking, instrumentation, and data reduction computing equipment. The LCC was connected to the Mobile Launcher Platforms by a high-speed data link; and during launch a system of 62 closed-circuit television cameras transmitted to 100 monitor screens in the LCC. Large cryogenic tanks located near

3034-523: The VAB, would not be built but reserved for future expansion. As the original Pad A would no longer be built, the naming was changed to run south-to-north, so that the two pads that would be built would be A and B. If the original 39A at the north end were ever built, it would now be known as 39C. Some consideration for C's construction was made: the Crawlerway initially splits off from A toward B running north-northwest, and then bends north toward B

3116-657: The baskets. The system was dismantled in 2012, as seen in this video . Connections between the Launch Control Center , Mobile Launcher Platform , and space vehicle were made in the Pad Terminal Connection Room (PTCR), which was a two-story series of rooms located beneath the launch pad on the west side of the flame trench. The "room" was constructed of reinforced concrete and protected by up to 20 feet (6.1 m) of fill dirt. The first launch from Launch Complex 39 came in 1967 with

3198-458: The booster on the ground. An accidental pad firing of a launch escape system occurred during the attempted launch of the uncrewed Soyuz 7K-OK No.1 spacecraft on December 14, 1966. The vehicle's strap-on boosters did not ignite, preventing the rocket from leaving the pad. About 30 minutes later, while the vehicle was being secured, the LES engine fired. Separation charges started a fire in the rocket's third stage, leading to an explosion that killed

3280-629: The booster's BE-3 engine suffered a failure at about 1 minute into the flight. The launch escape system was triggered and the capsule successfully separated and landed nominally. The flight was carrying microgravity scientific payloads in the crew capsule, without crew on board. [REDACTED]  This article incorporates public domain material from websites or documents of the National Aeronautics and Space Administration . Maxime Faget Maxime Allen "Max" Faget (pronounced fah-ZHAY ; August 26, 1921 – October 9, 2004)

3362-506: The bullet-shaped protective launch shroud. Under NASA's Commercial Crew Development (CCDev) program Blue Origin was awarded $ 3.7 million for development of an innovative 'pusher' LAS, it is used on the New Shepard Crew Capsule . Also under NASA's CCDev program, SpaceX was awarded $ 75 million for the development of their own version of a "pusher" LAS. Their Dragon 2 spacecraft uses its SuperDraco engines during

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3444-467: The construction of a large Horizontal Integration Facility (HIF) similar to that used at existing SpaceX-leased facilities at Cape Canaveral Space Force Station and Vandenberg Air Force Base , horizontal integration being markedly difference from the vertical integration process used to assemble NASA's Apollo and Space Shuttle vehicles at the launch complex. Additionally, new instrumentation and control systems were installed, and substantial new plumbing

3526-454: The current boundary road for the LC39 site, and Playlandia Beach Road on the north. At the time, the original three were named from north to south: Pad A through Pad C. The pads were evenly spaced 8,700 feet (2,700 m) apart to avoid damage in the event of an explosion on a pad. In March 1963, plans were formalized to build only two of the three pads; the northernmost, furthest from

3608-414: The damage was the result of carbonation of epoxy and corrosion of steel anchors that held the refractory bricks in the trench in place. The damage had been exacerbated by the fact that hydrochloric acid is an exhaust by-product of the solid rocket boosters. After the launch of Skylab in 1973, Pad 39A was reconfigured for the Space Shuttle, with shuttle launches beginning with STS-1 in 1981, flown by

3690-409: The design of the launch complex, as it had to encompass two very different possibilities and rockets. Accordingly, early designs from 1961 show two sets of launch pads. The first was a series of three pads for Saturn along Playalinda Beach , with the southernmost near the current Eddy Creek Boat Launch, and the northernmost around Klondike Beach. Far to the south was a similar set of three pads for Nova,

3772-567: The end, its most lasting contribution was to clearly identify the trade-offs inherent in any reusable design. In 1962 Faget became the Director of Engineering and Development at the Manned Spacecraft Center and continued to work for NASA until his retirement in 1981, shortly after the second Space Shuttle flight ( STS-2 ). After his retirement, he was among the founders of Space Industries Inc. , established in 1982. One of

3854-615: The external tank arrived from its manufacturing facility in Louisiana by barge, and the orbiter waited in the Orbiter Processing Facility (OPF). The SRBs were first stacked in the VAB, then the External tank was mounted between them, and then, with the help of a massive crane, the orbiter was lowered and connected to the External tank. The payload to be installed at the launch pad was independently transported in

3936-416: The external tank. A Sound Suppression Water System (SSWS) was added to protect the Space Shuttle and its payload from effects of the intense sound wave pressure generated by its engines. An elevated water tank on a 290-foot (88 m) tower near each pad stored 300,000 U.S. gallons (1,100,000 liters) of water, which was released onto the mobile launcher platform just before engine ignition. The water muffled

4018-400: The external tank. This prevented the formation of ice that could fall and damage the shuttle. The Hydrogen Vent Line Access Arm mated the External Tank's Ground Umbilical Carrier Plate (GUCP) to the launch pad hydrogen vent line. The GUCP provided support for plumbing and cables, called umbilicals, that transferred fluids, gases, and electrical signals between two pieces of equipment. While

4100-549: The facility to service a modified Centaur-G upper stage), along with budgetary restraints, it was not ready until 1986. The first shuttle flight to use it was STS-51-L , which ended with the Challenger disaster , after which the first return-to-flight mission, STS-26 , was launched from 39B. Just as for the first 24 shuttle flights, LC-39A supported the final shuttle flights, starting with STS-117 in June 2007 and ending with

4182-428: The federal government inventory. The Constellation program planned to use LC-39A for uncrewed Ares V launches and LC-39B for crewed Ares I launches. In preparation for this, NASA began modifying LC-39B to support Ares I launches with 39A planned to be modified in the mid 2010s for Ares V launches. Prior to Ares I-X, the last Shuttle launch from pad 39B was the nighttime launch of STS-116 on December 9, 2006. To support

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4264-721: The final Shuttle mission to the Hubble Space Telescope STS-125 launched from pad 39A in May 2009, Endeavour was placed on 39B if needed to launch the STS-400 rescue mission. After the completion of STS-125 , 39B was converted to launch the single test flight of the Constellation Program Ares ;I-X on October 28, 2009. Pad 39B was then planned to have the FSS and RSS removed in preparation for Ares I. However, in 2010,

4346-405: The firing rooms, a news facility famous for the iconic countdown clock seen in television coverage and photos, and various logistical and operational support buildings. SpaceX leases Launch Complex 39A from NASA and has modified the pad to support Falcon 9 and Falcon Heavy launches. NASA began modifying Launch Complex 39B in 2007 to accommodate the now defunct Constellation program , and

4428-438: The first Saturn V launch, which carried the uncrewed Apollo 4 spacecraft. The second uncrewed launch, Apollo 6 , also used Pad 39A. With the exception of Apollo 10 , which used Pad 39B (due to the "all-up" testing resulting in a 2-month turnaround period), all crewed Apollo-Saturn V launches, commencing with Apollo 8 , used Pad 39A. A total of thirteen Saturn Vs were launched for Apollo, including

4510-404: The first launch at pad 39A—of a Falcon Heavy—as early as 2015, as they had had architects and engineers working on the new design and modifications since 2013. By late 2014, a preliminary date for a wet dress rehearsal of the Falcon Heavy was set for no earlier than July 1, 2015. Due to a failure in a June 2015 Falcon 9 launch, SpaceX had to delay launching the Falcon Heavy in order to focus on

4592-571: The former crawlerway path. Also in 2015, the launch mount for the Falcon Heavy was constructed on Pad 39A over the existing infrastructure. The work on both the HIF building and the pad was substantially complete by late 2015. A rollout test of the new Transporter Erector was conducted in November 2015. In February 2016, SpaceX indicated that they had "completed and activated Launch Complex 39A", but still had more work yet to do to support crewed flights. SpaceX originally planned to be ready to accomplish

4674-567: The highest-numbered launch pad at CCAFS was Launch Complex 37. A proposed Launch Complex 38 had been set aside for the future expansion of the Atlas-Centaur program, but ultimately never built. The new complex was thus designated Launch Complex 39. The method of reaching the Moon had not yet been decided. The two leading alternatives were direct ascent , which launched a single huge rocket; and Earth orbit rendezvous , where two or more launches of smaller rockets would place several parts of

4756-404: The intense sound waves produced by the engines. Due to heating of the water, a large quantity of steam and water vapor was produced during launch. The Gaseous Oxygen Vent Arm positioned a hood, often called the "Beanie Cap", over the top of the external tank (ET) nose cone during fueling. Heated gaseous nitrogen was used there to remove the extremely cold gaseous oxygen that normally vented out of

4838-589: The lunar departure spacecraft which would be assembled in orbit. The former would require a huge Nova-class launcher and pads, while the latter would require several rockets to be launched in quick succession. Furthermore, the selection of the actual rockets was still ongoing; NASA was proposing the Nova design while their newly-acquired former Army group in Huntsville Alabama had proposed a series of slightly smaller designs known as Saturn. This complicated

4920-537: The main ingress/egress hatch (using a specially developed parachute system that could be worn over a spacesuit), although only when the Shuttle was in a controlled glide. The Orion spacecraft which was developed to follow the Space Shuttle program uses a Mercury and Apollo-style escape rocket system, while an alternative system, called the Max Launch Abort System (MLAS), was investigated and would have used existing solid-rocket motors integrated into

5002-523: The original layout. No diagram of the access to E can be found. Had all of them been built, C, D and E would have formed a triangle. Months before a launch, the three stages of the Saturn V launch vehicle and the components of the Apollo spacecraft were brought inside the Vehicle Assembly Building (VAB) and assembled, in one of four bays, into a 363-foot (111 m)-tall space vehicle on one of three Mobile Launchers (ML). Each Mobile Launcher consisted of

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5084-457: The pads and facilities by private companies to fly missions for the commercial space market, culminating in a 20-year lease agreement with SpaceX for Pad 39A. Talks for use of the pad were underway between NASA and Space Florida —the State of Florida 's economic development agency —as early as 2011, but no deal materialized by 2012, and NASA then pursued other options for removing the pad from

5166-462: The pads stored the liquid hydrogen and liquid oxygen (LOX) for the second and third stages of the Saturn V. The highly explosive nature of these chemicals required numerous safety measures at the launch complex. The pads were located 8,730 feet (2,660 m) away from each other. Before tanking operations began and during launch, non-essential personnel were excluded from the danger area. Each pad had

5248-545: The press as a baseline contender for the Space Transportation System (STS). North American also studied a version of the same basic system with a much larger 50,000 pounds (23,000 kg) payload. However, the DC-3's nose-high re-entry profile was controversial, and eventually doomed it when the U.S. Air Force joined the Shuttle program and demanded cross-range performance that the DC-3 could not meet. In

5330-752: The projects of the company was the Wake Shield Facility , a device to create near-perfect vacuum in the thermosphere . The WSF flew three times with a Space Shuttle in 1994–96 ( STS-60 , STS-69 , STS-80 ). In 1962, Faget received the Golden Plate Award of the American Academy of Achievement . Faget was inducted into the 1969 National Inventors Hall of Fame, and received the NASA Outstanding Leadership Medal and John J. Montgomery Award . He

5412-415: The remaining two pads, now known as D and E. Pad D would have been built due west of Pad C, some distance inland along Patrol Road. Access to D would have branched off westward from the crawlerway at the point where C's crawlerway turned north. Pad E would have continued the line of pads along the coast, north of C near Playalinda Beach , close to the original location of the southernmost pad in

5494-421: The rocket. The system included seven baskets suspended from seven slidewires that extended from the fixed service structure to a landing zone 370 meters (1,200 ft) to the west. Each basket could hold up to three people, which slid down the wire reaching up to 80 kilometers per hour (50 mph), eventually reaching a gentle stop by means of a braking system catch net and drag chain which slowed and then halted

5576-516: The service module that can propel the spacecraft away from its Atlas V launch vehicle in the event of an emergency on the pad or during ascent. The engines, which use hypergolic propellants and generate 40,000 pounds-force of thrust each, are provided by Aerojet Rocketdyne . The abort system was tested successfully during the Starliner's pad abort test on November 4, 2019 at White Sands Missile Range . Orbital Sciences Corporation intends to sell

5658-644: The site of Pad 39A. During the 1920s, Peter E. Studebaker Jr., son of the automobile magnate , built a small casino at De Soto Beach eight miles (13 km) north of the Canaveral lighthouse. In 1948, the Navy transferred the former Banana River Naval Air Station, located south of Cape Canaveral , to the Air Force for use in testing captured German V-2 rockets. The site's location on the East Florida coast

5740-514: The solicitation contained no preference on the use of the facility as multi-use or single-use. "The [solicitation] document merely asks bidders to explain their reasons for selecting one approach instead of the other and how they would manage the facility." On April 14, 2014, the privately owned launch service provider SpaceX signed a 20-year lease for Launch Complex 39A (LC-39A). The pad was modified to support launches of both Falcon 9 and Falcon Heavy launch vehicles, modifications that included

5822-411: The southernmost just south of the Astronaut Beach House and the northern roughly at the location of the current Pad A. The final selection of lunar orbit rendezvous and the Saturn V led to numerous changes. The Nova pads disappeared, and the three Saturn pads were moved southward. The southernmost was now at the current location of Pad A, while the northernmost was located between Patrol Road,

5904-467: The space vehicle—to provide access to each of the three rocket stages and the spacecraft for people, wiring, and plumbing—while the vehicle was on the launch pad and were swung away from the vehicle at launch. Technicians, engineers, and astronauts used the uppermost Spacecraft Access Arm to access the crew cabin. At the end of the arm, the white room provided an environmentally controlled and protected area for astronauts and their equipment before entering

5986-593: The spacecraft. Early diagrams of the proposed layout also included the Nuclear Assembly Building, NAB, northeast of the VAB. These would be used to prepare the nuclear rocket engines being developed under the NERVA program, before moving them to the VAB for assembly into a rocket stack. This program was cancelled and the NAB was not built. When the stack integration was completed, the Mobile Launcher

6068-534: The system on January 19, 2020 during a full-scale simulation of a Falcon 9 rocket malfunction at Kennedy Space Center Launch Complex 39 , from where it has later launched crews to the International Space Station. The second crewed spacecraft selected by NASA for its CCDEV program was Boeing 's CST-100 Starliner , which, like SpaceX's Dragon 2 spacecraft, uses a "pusher" launch escape system, consisting of four launch abort engines mounted on

6150-713: The uncrewed launch of the Skylab space station in 1973. The mobile launchers were then modified for the shorter Saturn IB rockets, by adding a "milk-stool" extension platform to the launch pedestal, so that the S-IVB upper stage and Apollo spacecraft swing arms would reach their targets. These were used for three crewed Skylab flights and the Apollo–Soyuz Test Project , since the Saturn IB pads 34 and 37 at Cape Canaveral SFS had been decommissioned. The thrust to allow

6232-542: Was added for a variety of rocket liquids and gases. In 2015, SpaceX built the Horizontal Integration Facility just outside the perimeter of the existing launch pad in order to house both the Falcon 9 and the Falcon Heavy rockets, and their associated hardware and payloads, during preparation for flight. Both types of launch vehicles will be transported from the HIF to the launch pad aboard a Transporter Erector (TE) which will ride on rails up

6314-613: Was an American mechanical engineer . Faget was the designer of the Mercury spacecraft , and contributed to the later Gemini and Apollo spacecraft as well as the Space Shuttle . Faget was the son of American doctor Guy Henry Faget , and great-grandson of another prominent physician, Jean Charles Faget . Born in Stann Creek Town, British Honduras (today Dangriga , Belize ), he attended City College of San Francisco in San Francisco, California , and he received

6396-935: Was built by the Grand Central Rocket Company in Redlands, California (which later became the Lockheed Propulsion Company ). Apollo used a design that had many similarities to the Mercury system. LES continue to be used on the Russian Soyuz and Chinese Shenzhou spacecraft . The SpaceX Dragon 2 uses a hypergolic liquid-fueled launch abort system integrated to the capsule and the Boeing Starliner uses abort thrusters in its service module. The Soviet Vostok and American Gemini spacecraft both made use of ejection seats . The European Space Agency 's Hermes and

6478-602: Was developing a piloted spacecraft named after Faget, the MAX-1 , but the project was halted due to issues around the effects of rapid acceleration of humans in a standing position. Kennedy Space Center Launch Complex 39 Launch Complex 39 ( LC-39 ) is a rocket launch site at the John F. Kennedy Space Center on Merritt Island in Florida , United States. The site and its collection of facilities were originally built as

6560-657: Was ideal for this purpose, in that launches would be over the ocean, away from populated areas. This site became the Joint Long Range Proving Ground in 1949 and was renamed Patrick Air Force Base in 1950 and Patrick Space Force Base in 2020. The Air Force annexed part of Cape Canaveral, to the north, in 1951, forming the Air Force Missile Test Center, the future Cape Canaveral Space Force Station (CCSFS). Missile and rocketry testing and development would take place here through

6642-678: Was inducted into the Houston National Space Hall of Fame in 1969. He was inducted into the International Space Hall of Fame in 1990. Faget was inducted into the National Aviation Hall of Fame in 2020. Faget died of bladder cancer on October 9, 2004, aged 83. Faget was co-inventor on five United States patents issued to Space Industries, Inc. between 1988 and 1992: The private spaceflight organization Copenhagen Suborbitals

6724-462: Was moved atop one of two crawler-transporters , or Missile Crawler Transporter Facilities, 3–4 miles (4.8–6.4 km) to its pad at a speed of 1 mile per hour (1.6 km/h). Each crawler weighed 6,000,000 pounds (2,720 t) and was capable of keeping the space vehicle and its launcher platform level while negotiating the 5 percent grade to the pad. At the pad, the ML was placed on six steel pedestals, plus four additional extensible columns. After

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