They marked a brilliant era for the American space agency, and for three decades they became the living image of the conquest of space..<\/p>\n
This July 8 marked 10 years since the last launch of a NASA STS space shuttle, specifically Atlantis, on July 8, 2011 from the Kennedy Space Center, in Florida. There were a total of five operational shuttles: Columbia, Challenger, Discovery, Atlantis and Endeavor<\/strong>, the first two being lost in separate accidents that occurred in 1986 (during the launch of Challenger) and in 2003 (during the re-entry of the Columbia). In both accidents, all the crew members died (14 people in total). Additionally, there was a sixth non-operational shuttle, the Enterprise, used for atmospheric testing, being launched from a Boeing 747.<\/p>\n Between 1981 and 2011 these shuttles carried out 135 missions<\/strong>. The STS was made up of four parts: the orbital vehicle, which returned to Earth by landing like an airplane; a non-reusable external tank; and two accelerator rockets (the SRB), reusable and located on both sides of the tank. The orbital vehicle was equipped with a cargo hold<\/strong> with two doors that opened to allow the deployment of artificial satellites, Space Station modules and other objects, such as the Hubble Space Telescope. The warehouse was equipped with an articulated robotic arm called SRMS and nicknamed Canadarm<\/strong>, as it was manufactured by the Canadian company Spar Aeroespace.<\/p>\n
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