The NASA acting Administrator has picked a Space Shuttle to move to Houston, and the lucky vehicle is… NASA’s not telling.
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“We have no public statement at this time,” is the official word from the US space agency.
The requirement to move one of the Space Shuttles was included in US President Donald Trump’s mega budget bill, which allocated $85 million for transporting the vehicle to Texas and constructing a facility to display it. The question is… which Space Shuttle?
There are three retired orbiters that have flown in space. Endeavour is at the California Science Center in Los Angeles, where it is being prepared for display in a “ready for launch” configuration. Atlantis can be viewed as if it were on-orbit, with payload bay doors open, at Kennedy Space Center. Discovery is parked up at the Smithsonian’s Udvar-Hazy Center.
A fourth Shuttle, Enterprise, which was used for fit checks and approach and landing tests, but never launched into orbit, can be found at the Intrepid Museum in New York.
Taking aside the question of how a Space Shuttle might be moved at this stage, NASA’s reluctance to name the vehicle hints that perhaps even just picking one is not quite as straightforward as lawmakers think it is. According to the Smithsonian, NASA transferred the vehicle to it in 2012. Ownership of Endeavour was transferred to the California Science Center in 2011. Atlantis is a possibility, but it is Discovery that was the subject of the original “Bring the Space Shuttle Home” act.
Regardless of which Space Shuttle is selected, moving the vehicle remains a near-insurmountable challenge when you look at the funds allocated for this. The Shuttle Carrier Aircraft are long retired and would require considerable investment to bring them back to flight-worthy status. Moving the Space Shuttle by road is a logistical nightmare – memories of wheeling Endeavour to the California Science Center will still be fresh for planners – and transporting the vehicle by sea carries its own salty challenges.
Alternatively, a Space Shuttle could be cut into pieces for transportation, but doing so would cause incalculable harm to an irreplaceable artifact.
Naming the lucky Shuttle should therefore be the least of NASA’s problems. However, its inability to do so does not bode well for if and when the selected vehicle has to make its trek to Texas. ®