{"id":858,"date":"2013-01-13T13:21:56","date_gmt":"2013-01-13T13:21:56","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/localhost\/wordpress65\/?p=858"},"modified":"2013-01-13T13:21:56","modified_gmt":"2013-01-13T13:21:56","slug":"space-history-first-and-new-nasa-communication-relay-satellite","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.grayrinehart.com\/blog\/space-history-first-and-new-nasa-communication-relay-satellite\/","title":{"rendered":"A Space History First, AND a New NASA Communication Relay Satellite"},"content":{"rendered":"

Twenty years ago today — January 13, 1993 — the Space Shuttle Endeavour<\/em> launched from the Kennedy Space Center carrying a new Tracking and Data Relay Satellite (TDRS).<\/p>\n

\"\"
\n(EVA-1 Crewmember Greg Harbaugh working in the Shuttle’s payload bay. NASA image.)<\/em><\/p>\n

\nThe STS-54<\/a> crew — John H. Casper, Donald R. McMonagle, Gregory J. Harbaugh, Mario Runco, and Susan J. Helms — spent almost six days in space. They deployed the fifth TDRS spacecraft during their first day in orbit; the TDRS’s Inertial Upper Stage maneuvered it into its higher operational orbit.<\/p>\n

The crew spent their remaining time in space conducting a variety of experiments: they took spectrographic readings of X-ray sources with the Diffuse X-ray Spectrometer (DXS); studied biological systems under microcravity using the Commercial General Bioprocessing Apparatus (CGPA), the Chromosome and Plant Cell Division in Space Experiment (CHROMEX), and the Physiological and Anatomical Rodent Experiment (PARE); measured flame propagation in microgravity with the Solid Surface Combustion Experiment (SSCE); et cetera.<\/p>\n

As for the space history “first” — on this mission, then-Major Helms became the first U.S. military woman to fly in space. Still on active duty in the USAF, she is now a Lieutenant General<\/a> and the Commander of 14th Air Force at Vandenberg AFB.<\/p>\n\"Facebook\"<\/a>\"twitter\"<\/a>\"pinterest\"<\/a>\"linkedin\"<\/a>\"mail\"<\/a>by <\/span>\"feather\"<\/a>","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Twenty years ago today — January 13, 1993 — the Space Shuttle Endeavour launched from the Kennedy Space Center carrying a new Tracking and Data Relay Satellite (TDRS). (EVA-1 Crewmember Greg Harbaugh working in the Shuttle’s payload bay. NASA image.) The STS-54 crew — John H. Casper, Donald R. McMonagle, \u2026 Continue reading → <\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[5],"tags":[13,26,11,12,17],"class_list":["post-858","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-military","tag-air-force","tag-launch","tag-space-history","tag-space-shuttle","tag-vandenberg"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.grayrinehart.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/858","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.grayrinehart.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.grayrinehart.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.grayrinehart.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.grayrinehart.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=858"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.grayrinehart.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/858\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.grayrinehart.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=858"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.grayrinehart.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=858"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.grayrinehart.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=858"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}