Title

Rocket booster recovery, second Space Shuttle flight, November 1981. Creator: NASA.

Caption

Rocket booster recovery, second Space Shuttle flight, November 1981. The rocket booster is recovered from the sea. The space shuttle's solid rocket boosters were reusable. After a shuttle launch, the casings were recovered from the Atlantic Ocean and towed back to NASA's Kennedy Space Center. The expended boosters were disassembled, refurbished and reloaded with solid propellant for reuse on another shuttle mission. The Space Shuttle program, (official name, Space Transportation System or STS), was the fourth human spaceflight program carried out by the National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA), which accomplished routine Earth-to-orbit transport for crew and cargo between 1981 and 2011.

Date

1981

Credit line

Photo12/Heritage Images/Heritage Space

Reference

HRM19F02_378

Model release

No

License type

Rights managed

Available size

67,1Mb (2,6Mb) / 18,4in x 14,2in / 5520 x 4251 (300dpi)

Keywords

ocean sea space space shuttle geography color Atlantic Ocean rocket recovery concept spacecraft space exploration space travel recovering Colour geographical feature photograph NASA National Aeronautics and Space Administration Heritage Space rocket booster photograph