KENNEDY SPACE CENTER, FLA. - On the Shuttle Landing Facility at NASA Kennedy Space Center, the Atlas V fairing halves for the New Horizons spacecraft are being covered by a protective container before their transport to Astrotech Space Operations in Titusville. The fairing later will be placed around the New Horizons spacecraft in the Payload Hazardous Service Facility. The fairing later will be placed around the New Horizons spacecraft in the Payload Hazardous Service Facility. A fairing protects a spacecraft during launch and flight through the atmosphere. Once in space, it is jettisoned. The Lockheed Martin Atlas V is the launch vehicle for the New Horizons spacecraft, which is designed to make the first reconnaissance of Pluto and Charon - a "double planet" and the last planet in our solar system to be visited by spacecraft. The mission will then visit one or more objects in the Kuiper Belt region beyond Neptune. New Horizons is scheduled to launch in January 2006, swing past Jupiter for a gravity boost and scientific studies in February or March 2007, and reach Pluto and its moon, Charon, in July 2015. KSC-05pd2276

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NASA's Lunar Reconnaissance Orbiter (LRO) spacecraft at Goddard Space Flight Center

CAPE CANAVERAL, Fla. – Workers secure NASA's Radiation Belt Storm Probe A, enclosed in a protective shipping container, onto a flatbed truck at the Shuttle Landing Facility at NASA’s Kennedy Space Center in Florida. The twin RBSP spacecraft will be transported to the Astrotech payload processing facility near Kennedy Space Center where Applied Physics Laboratory technicians will begin spacecraft testing and prelaunch preparations. Nitrogen will be pumped into the canisters during transport to provide the proper environmental control for the spacecraft. The RBSP mission will help us understand the sun’s influence on Earth and near-Earth space by studying the Earth’s radiation belts on various scales of space and time. The RBSP instruments will provide the measurements needed to characterize and quantify the plasma processes that produce very energetic ions and relativistic electrons. The mission is part of NASA’s broader Living With a Star Program that was conceived to explore fundamental processes that operate throughout the solar system, and in particular those that generate hazardous space weather effects in the vicinity of Earth and phenomena that could impact solar system exploration. RBSP is scheduled to begin its mission of exploration of Earth's Van Allen Radiation Belts and the extremes of space weather after launch. Launch aboard a United Launch Alliance Atlas V rocket is scheduled for August 23. For more information, visit http://www.nasa.gov/rbsp. Photo credit: NASA/Kim Shiflett KSC-2012-2631

From left, U.S Air Force Tech. Sgt. Gary Dobson and

The last Defense Meteorological Support Program (DMSP)

CAPE CANAVERAL, Fla. – A crane lifts and transfers an Ares I-X upper stage simulator segment from the Delta Mariner at Port Canaveral, Fla., onto a flatbed truck. They will be transported to the Vehicle Assembly Building's high bay 4 at NASA's Kennedy Space Center in Florida. The upper stage simulator will be used in the test flight identified as Ares I-X in 2009. The Ares I-X test flight will provide NASA an early opportunity to test and prove hardware, facilities and ground operations associated with the Ares I crew launch vehicle. It also will allow NASA to gather critical data during ascent of the integrated Orion crew exploration vehicle and the Ares I rocket. The data will ensure the entire vehicle system is safe and fully operational before astronauts begin traveling to orbit. The simulator segments will simulate the mass and the outer mold line and will be more than 100 feet of the total vehicle height of 327 feet. The simulator comprises 11 segments that are approximately 18 feet in diameter. Most of the segments will be approximately 10 feet high, ranging in weight from 18,000 to 60,000 pounds, for a total of approximately 450,000 pounds. Photo credit: NASA/Cory Huston KSC-08pd3505

Aviation Ordnanceman Airman Apprentice Aaron Bussereth,

KENNEDY SPACE CENTER, FLA. - On the Shuttle Landing Facility at NASA Kennedy Space Center, the Atlas V fairing halves for the New Horizons spacecraft are being covered by a protective container before their transport to Astrotech Space Operations in Titusville. The fairing later will be placed around the New Horizons spacecraft in the Payload Hazardous Service Facility. The fairing later will be placed around the New Horizons spacecraft in the Payload Hazardous Service Facility. A fairing protects a spacecraft during launch and flight through the atmosphere. Once in space, it is jettisoned. The Lockheed Martin Atlas V is the launch vehicle for the New Horizons spacecraft, which is designed to make the first reconnaissance of Pluto and Charon - a "double planet" and the last planet in our solar system to be visited by spacecraft. The mission will then visit one or more objects in the Kuiper Belt region beyond Neptune. New Horizons is scheduled to launch in January 2006, swing past Jupiter for a gravity boost and scientific studies in February or March 2007, and reach Pluto and its moon, Charon, in July 2015. KSC-05pd2276

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Summary

KENNEDY SPACE CENTER, FLA. - On the Shuttle Landing Facility at NASA Kennedy Space Center, the Atlas V fairing halves for the New Horizons spacecraft are being covered by a protective container before their transport to Astrotech Space Operations in Titusville. The fairing later will be placed around the New Horizons spacecraft in the Payload Hazardous Service Facility. The fairing later will be placed around the New Horizons spacecraft in the Payload Hazardous Service Facility. A fairing protects a spacecraft during launch and flight through the atmosphere. Once in space, it is jettisoned. The Lockheed Martin Atlas V is the launch vehicle for the New Horizons spacecraft, which is designed to make the first reconnaissance of Pluto and Charon - a "double planet" and the last planet in our solar system to be visited by spacecraft. The mission will then visit one or more objects in the Kuiper Belt region beyond Neptune. New Horizons is scheduled to launch in January 2006, swing past Jupiter for a gravity boost and scientific studies in February or March 2007, and reach Pluto and its moon, Charon, in July 2015.

Space Shuttle Program

The Space Shuttle program was the United States government's manned launch vehicle program from 1981 to 2011, administered by NASA and officially beginning in 1972. The Space Shuttle system—composed of an orbiter launched with two reusable solid rocket boosters and a disposable external fuel tank— carried up to eight astronauts and up to 50,000 lb (23,000 kg) of payload into low Earth orbit (LEO). When its mission was complete, the orbiter would re-enter the Earth's atmosphere and lands as a glider. Although the concept had been explored since the late 1960s, the program formally commenced in 1972 and was the focus of NASA's manned operations after the final Apollo and Skylab flights in the mid-1970s. It started with the launch of the first shuttle Columbia on April 12, 1981, on STS-1. and finished with its last mission, STS-135 flown by Atlantis, in July 2011.