STS-62-A | |
Names List: | Space Transportation System |
Mission Type: | DoD satellite deployment (planned) |
Operator: | NASA |
Spacecraft: | (planned) |
Crew Size: | 7 |
Launch Date: | July 15, 1986 (planned, not launched) |
Launch Rocket: | Space Shuttle Discovery |
Launch Site: | Vandenberg, SLC-6 |
Launch Contractor: | Rockwell International |
Landing Date: | July 19, 1986 (planned) |
Landing Site: | Vandenberg, Runway 12/30 |
Orbit Reference: | Geocentric orbit (planned) |
Orbit Regime: | Low Earth orbit |
Orbit Inclination: | 48.45° |
Orbit Period: | 90.90 minutes |
Apsis: | gee |
Crew Photo: | STS-62A Crew.jpg |
Crew Photo Caption: | Back row: Aldridge, Crippen and Watterson Front row: G. Gardner, Mullane, Ross and D. Gardner |
Programme: | Space Shuttle program |
Previous Mission: | STS-51-L (25) |
Next Mission: | STS-26 |
Programme2: | Cancelled Shuttle missions |
Previous Mission2: | STS-61-H |
Next Mission2: | STS-61-M |
STS-62-A was a planned NASA Space Shuttle mission to deliver a reconnaissance payload (Teal Ruby) into polar orbit. It was expected to use Discovery. It would have been the first crewed launch from Vandenberg Air Force Base in California, and the first crewed mission to go into polar orbit.
The mission designation, STS-62-A, meant: 6=fiscal year 1986, 2=Vandenberg (1=Kennedy Space Center), and A=first flight in that fiscal year.
The destruction of Challenger and subsequent halt of the Space Shuttle program led to the cancellation of the mission.
Guy Gardner, Jerry Ross, and Mike Mullane were members of the second post-Challenger mission STS-27 — a classified mission for the DoD — during which the Lacrosse-1 radar reconnaissance spacecraft was allegedly deployed.[1] [2]