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Gaping Inside The Huge Vehicle Assembly Building NASA Used For Space Shuttles And Moon Missions
The Vehicle Assembly Building at the Kennedy Space Center in Florida on Nov. 16, 2009, just hours before the launch of STS-129. Credit: Elizabeth Howell
ORLANDO, FLORIDA – There’s something about this city that brings out the crazy travel planner in me. I visited here four times betting a shuttle would launch, luckily winning on three occasions. I also once took an epic bus trip from here as far south as Fort Lauderdale before zooming back north, looking at space exhibits up and down the coast.
This time, it was to catch the Vehicle Assembly Building tour before it was gone. Tours inside the iconic, huge structure — best known as the spot where the Apollo rockets and space shuttle went through final assembly before going to the pad — are closing down on Sunday (Feb. 23). Warned by Ken Kremer and others that soon the public couldn’t get inside, I booked a ticket late last month after the announcement was made.
I came in search of the past, but what I saw instead was the future — an agency preparing to hand over a launch pad to SpaceX, and at least part of an Orion spacecraft on the VAB floor, ready to be shipped to Langley, Virginia.
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Read the rest of Gaping Inside The Huge Vehicle Assembly Building NASA Used For Space Shuttles And Moon Missions (818 words)
© Elizabeth Howell for Universe Today, 2014. |
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Source: http://www.universetoday.com/109539/gaping-inside-the-huge-vehicle-assembly-building-nasa-used-for-space-shuttles-and-moon-missions/
