Challenger, the second orbiter to become operational at Kennedy Space Center, was named after an American Naval research vessel that sailed the Atlantic and Pacific Oceans during the 1870's. The NAVY vessel used to retrieve the Apollo 17 module was also named Challenger.Challenger joined the NASA fleet of reusable winged space ships in July 1982. It flew nine successful missions before the accident on 1/28/86. Challenger and its seven member crew parished 73 seconds after lift off when a booster failed resulting in the loss of the ship and its crew.
Originally Challenger was a test vehicle constructed by Rockwell. Structural testing was done at Lockhead Plant 42 on 2/04/78. The orbiter was constructed with the idea to reduce the weight of all components used in construction of the ships. It was difficult to accurately predict mechanical and thermal loading with the computer software avaible at the time. The only way to be certain that an orbiter would be safe was to expose it to intensive testing and analysis. Over the next 11 months Challenger would be exposed to intense vibration testing in a steel rig made just for the Space Shuttle Testing Program. The rig exposed the orbiter to all conditions it would encounter during a mission.
NASA awarded Rockwell a supplemental contract to convert Challenger from a test vehicle to a space-rated orbiter. Challenger returned to Rockwell 11/07/79 and its' conversion was started. The conversion on Challenger was a lot easier than it would have been to convert Enterprise to a space-rated orbiter. Still the conversion involved a major part of Challenger to be taken rebuilt. The craft was built with a simulated crew module and the forward fuse-luge halves had to be separated to gain access to the crew module. The wings had to be modified and reinforced to incorporate the results of structural testing and two heads-up displays were installed into the cockpit. Empty weight 155,400lbs. at roll-out 175,111lbs. with main engines installed. Which was about 2,889lbs. lighter than Columbia.
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