ASSEMBLING AND SUPPLYING THE ISS

The Space Shuttle Fulfills its Mission

with Foreword and Afterword by Jerry Ross

former NASA astronaut

• Describes the missions that were designed to help assemble the International Space Station - the task for which the Shuttle was essentially designed.

• Features first-hand interviews with those involved in the program.

• Documents the success of the Space Shuttle in tackling the most complex engineering tasks ever performed in orbit.

The creation and utilization of the International Space Station (ISS) is a milestone in space exploration. But without the Space Shuttle, it would have remained an impossible dream. Assembling and Supplying the ISS is the story of how, between 1998 and 2011, the Shuttle became the platform which enabled the construction and continued operation of the primary scientific research facility in Earth orbit.

Fulfilling an objective it had been designed to complete decades before, 37 Shuttle missions carried the majority of the hardware needed to build the ISS and then acted as a ferry and supply train for early resident crews to the station. Building upon the decades of development and experience described in the companion volume Linking the Space Shuttle and Space Stations: Early Docking Technologies from Concept to Implementation, this book explores:

• a purpose-built hardware processing facility
• challenging spacewalking objectives
• extensive robotic operations
• undocking an unmanned orbiter

The experience and expertise gained through these missions is allowing space planners to improve construction skills in advance of even more ambitious plans in the future.