Space shuttle launch preparation

Friday 7 March 2008 — This is almost 17 years old. Be careful.

Rarely Seen Shuttle Activities is a series of photos of the preparation to launch the space shuttle. It is truly astounding to see the scale of effort required to launch the shuttle. Everything is massive. The entire shuttle is lifted on a crane inside a giant hanger to attach it to the external fuel tank. The entire assembly is mounted on an enormous tractor that travels half a mile per hour to transport it three miles to the launch pad. It’s mind-boggling to realize how much work goes into the construction and deployment of these machines.

The space shuttle was an early inspiration to me, so I still get excited seeing these kinds of photos.

BTW: on a side note, today is the six-year birthday of this blog. I started by writing in 2002 about my first job ever.

Comments

[gravatar]
Nate 12:19 AM on 8 Mar 2008
Dirty Jobs did a segment on the guys who clean the grime out of treads of the space shuttle's crawler. It was pretty crazy. They mentioned some really cool stuff like the road the crawler runs on is made of very special rocks from a very specific riverbed. Very cool.
[gravatar]
dbm 1:36 PM on 5 May 2011
Tennessee River Rock because it does not spark when crushed so it cannot cause fire or explosion

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