Shuttle Carrier Aircraft

The Shuttle Carrier Aircraft (SCA ) transporters were two modified Boeing 747-100 to transport the Space Shuttle to the National Aeronautics and Space Administration NASA. They were used to the Kennedy Space Center, where the shuttle landing took place on one of the alternate landing sites, the Air Force bases Edwards in California and White Sands in New Mexico, or at a different location for transport of the Space Shuttle. After the end of the shuttle program, the two aircraft now serve as spare parts for SOFIA, an airborne infrared telescope, which is operated by NASA in collaboration with the German Aerospace Center (DLR ).

Description

The SCA carried the orbiter from its landing sites back to the launch complex at the Kennedy Space Center. The space shuttles were lifted to a lifting crane, the Mate - demate device on the back of the SCAs and anchored there.

The flight of a space shuttle on the back brought some limitations. The range of the Boeing 747 was reduced to about 1,900 km. In comparison, an unloaded machine a distance of 10,000 km. For this reason, an SCA several refueling stops had to take on a transcontinental flight. The SCA has a maximum altitude of 7,600 m at a speed of Mach 0.7 and a fuel consumption of about 100 liters per kilometer flown.

Approximately 170 people were preparing the SCA for about a week before for a flight. A transcontinental flight cost about 1.7 million U.S. dollars.

Both aircraft are identical in their properties. While a machine is normally always at Dryden Flight Research Center at Edwards Air Force Base (typically N911NA ) was stationed, the other was on the Pinal Airpark in Arizona ( KMZJ ) (typically N905NA ). Up to the end of the era of U.S. space shuttles both SCA were at Edwards Air Force Base stationed (34 ° 57 ' 25 "N, 117 ° 52' 58 " W34.956944444444 - 117.88277777778 ).

NASA 905

The machine NASA 905 (Aircraft ID: N905NA ) was the first Shuttle Carrier Aircraft NASA. The Boeing 747-123, first flight on October 15, 1970, serial number 20107, Serial number 86 was acquired on 29 October 1970 by American Airlines. On 18 July 1974 she was admitted to the still current ID on NASA. Their original purpose at NASA served for the investigation of wake vortices. Her then barracks was the Dryden Flight Research Center.

1976 NASA was converted Boeing 905. The seats were removed, there were brackets attached to the shuttle and the hull was reinforced. At the exit point of the front bracket on the upper deck fell on both sides of the third, rear window to the victim. Additional tail fins provide more stability during transportation of the orbiter. The avionics and engines were improved and an emergency exit, which was similar to that of the first Boeing 747 test flights, was installed in N905NA. The escape tunnel, however, was later removed after the completion of the Approach and Landing Tests (ALT). It was feared that a person could get the emergency exit in an engine.

The Approach and Landing Tests of the Space Shuttle, which were carried out from 1977 with this airplane, was a series of 13 flights of the Space Shuttle prototype Enterprise. Five of these flights landed the Enterprise independently after separation from the SCA. In these tests, the SCA, and especially the shuttle on his flight and landing characteristics was investigated.

Until November 1990, NASA was the only SCA 905 to transport the Space Shuttle. In addition to the transport of the space shuttles between the start and landing sites NASA flew 905 1983 the space shuttle Enterprise to Europe for exhibitions in England, at the Paris Air Show and at the airport Cologne / Bonn (Pentecost 1983).

Remarkably, NASA flew 905 until at least mid-1982 in the painting of American Airlines. Only the complete rudder and renewed for the holders of the shuttles and to stiffen the hull areas with the current paint were provided, parts of the upper fuselage as usual at American Airlines only with new clear coat. The American lettering was visible to all new and up to now the current color as a shadow.

On 13 December 2010 have been carried out to prepare the transport of a Boeing Phantom Ray to Dryden Test Range at St. Louis test flights. This was the first transport flight during which no shuttle was mounted, but another plane.

The SCA N905NA has brought all drawn decommissioned space shuttles to their final destinations. After the last flight, the aircraft was flown on 24 September from the Los Angeles International Airport to the Dryden Flight Research Center to serve as a supplier of spare parts for the SOFIA program.

NASA 911

The second machine NASA 911 Boeing 747- 146SR, Serial Number 20781, Serial number 221, first flight 31 August 1973, was delivered on 26 September 1973, Japan Airlines ( JAL). It was after the acquisition of the NASA approved on 15 April 1988 at Boeing with the identifier N747BL and finally admitted after successful conversion to the aircraft identification on N911NA NASA. Unlike the first SCA this aircraft has five upper deck windows on each side, because originally the SR variants for extreme short distances were designed with high passenger volume, so that on the upper deck on both sides 10 windows later were installed in the 747-200 variants. The rear 5 were closed for the same reason as in the 905.

In their first use in 1991, the new Space Shuttle Endeavour by the manufacturer in Palmdale, California was transferred to the Kennedy Space Center with her.

On 8 February 2012, the aircraft flew for the last time. She was flown to the Dryden Flight Research Center to serve there as a source of spare parts for N905NA and the airborne telescope SOFIA.

Specifications

The comparison of the civilian version of the Boeing 747-100 with the SCA:

Others

• In the James Bond film Moonraker - Top Secret launches a space shuttle, mounted on a 747-100, in mid-flight, causing the 747 explodes. In reality, a space shuttle external tank without mounted fuel would not for such a launch.
• In the film Superman Returns Superman rescues a damaged Shuttle Carrier Aircraft. The shuttle is a new version, which was called " Genesis " and the SCA is a Boeing 777