The towers of Florida's historic launch pad have rocketed – Spaceflight Now

EDITOR'S NOTE: Updated at 07:50 EDT (12:50 GMT) after the demolition

The US Air Force on Thursday demolished towers formerly used to assemble Delta 2 rockets at Cape Canaveral for missions to Mars, four dozen flights to deploy the GPS navigation network and numerous scientific, commercial and payload launches.

With the push of a Brig button. General Wayne Monteith, commander of 45th Air Force Space Wing, demolished Thursday at 7 am (EDT) at 11am GMT at the launch pad of Complex 17, where two mobile gantries and towers fixed were overthrown by explosives. near the southern perimeter of the sprawling Cape Canaveral space station, Complex 17 is one of Florida's oldest space aerodromes, where 325 Thor and Delta boosters depart for missile tests and 1957 satellite deliveries to 2011.

The rocket that was once launched from Complex 17 is approaching retirement. The Delta 2 departed Cape Canaveral on September 10, 2011 to conduct a scientific study of the gravitational field of the moon, and another Delta 2 launcher departed in September from Vandenberg Air Force Base in California. 19659004] Built more than six decades ago at the dawn of the space age, the two 17-platform launch platforms – called 17A and 17B pavers – hosted 48 global positioning satellites, propelling the space network of a Delta 2 rocket is revealed at Complex 17B before launching in February 2007 with the mission THEMIS of NASA, composed of five identical satellites designed to study the aurora of the Earth. Credit: NASA / George Shelton

The first three Mars rovers of NASA – Sojourner, Spirit and Opportunity – have all left Complex 17 on the Delta 2 rockets, with the MESSENGER mission becoming the first Mercury orbiter spacecraft , the Spitzer Space Telescope, the Dawn Mission at the Asteroid Belt, the Kepler Observatory, a Planetary Hunter, several meteorological satellites and dozens of commercial and military communications spacecraft

Construction of Complex 17 began in April 1956 for the Thor Ballistic Missile Program. Thor's first launch from Block 17B took place in January 1957, followed by the first launch of Block 17A in August of the same year.

Delta rockets based on the designed Thor missile began to be launched from Complex 17 in the 1960s.

Meanwhile, builders of the Delta rocket family changed name through multiple mergers and business acquisitions, starting with the Douglas Aircraft Company and then by McDonnell Douglas, Boeing. and United Launch Alliance, formed in 2006 by the marriage of the Boeing and Lockheed Martin rocket programs.

Workers raised the height of the twin mobile towers of Complex 17 in the 1980s for the Delta 2 rocket, a job launcher 154 missions since its inaugural flight of Complex 17 on Valentine's Day 1989. The Delta 2 has recorded 152 successful missions at this time.

One of Delta 2's failures in January 1997 destroyed Complex 17 with huge burning debris after the rocket exploded 13 seconds after takeoff, destroying cars and trailers near the blockhouse bunker. , where more than 70 launch controllers escaped unscathed.

The launch towers suffered only slight damage during the Delta 2 blast and the flights of the 17 complex resumed four months later after repairs and an investigation of the accident. When the Delta 2 was put back into service, members of the launch team moved to a control center farther from the firing point.

Three Delta 3 rocket launchers, a hybrid between Delta launchers 2 and Delta 4 17B from 1998 to 2000.

Engineers have fond memories of launches at Complex 17, where 110 Delta 2 rockets left Earth until the facility was deactivated [19659004] "Growing up on Delta 2, it was mostly a pretty confined team.A few hundred people at Complex 17, a small team in the West (at Vandenberg Air Force Base in California)," said Tim Dunn, NASA's launch director at Boeing in the late 1990s.

Dunn's first mission as launch director was the last Delta 2 flight of Cape Canaveral in 2011.

"This one was very special, "he told Spaceflight Now in an interview. nn (bottom right) oversees the Countdow n before the final launch of Cape Canaveral's Delta 2 in September 2011. Credit: NASA / Kim Shiflett

Dunn worked on the Titan 4 rocket of the Air Force before to move to the Delta 2, a cheaper vehicle that could carry in space a fraction of the lifting capacity of the Titan 4, but which ended up flying more often and for several years.

"I went to Delta 2, and it was a little smaller," Dunn recalls in an interview with Spaceflight Now on the Delta. 2 at the next retreat. "You could get your hands on the systems, and you could walk a lot more easily on the tower, and the team you were working with was an order of magnitude smaller, which gave you the advantage. feeling part of the family. "

" When you grow up and invest so many years in a particular rocket, you really have the impression of knowing it both inside and out, " he said. The last Delta 2 flight in Florida, crews secured and removed ground equipment from Complex 17, assured that the area was free of hazardous materials and demolished the blockhouse in 2013.

NASA took the control of the complex 17 The Delta 2 pad 17A mission in 2009, and the space agency have maintained the 17B launch pad operational long enough to ship the lunar probes to the moon in 2011.

M. Dunn said that NASA and the Air Force had completed their "closure" of the Complex 17 in 2016. Then, the attention turned to the demolition of the launch launches, which the lor Air Force has been pushed back due to funding shortages. Mobile towers at each Complex 17 launch pad protected Delta 2 rockets and their payloads from Florida weather conditions and allowed workers to access the vehicle during assembly and launch preparations. The porticoes were removed from the rocket during the Delta 2 countdowns.

Fixed towers provided umbilical connections to the Delta 2 rockets.

Moon Express, a private company developing a commercial lunar lander, leased Air facilities. Force at Complex 17 and nearby Complex 18 to test his spacecraft. But the company does not need launch towers of the Delta 2.

On Wednesday, Bob Richards, chief executive and co-founder of Moon Express, said that future testing of the The lunar lander of the company will be held at Complex 18. [19659004] "Personally, I love the towers and find them inspiring.The demo of the towers was pre-ordered when we authorized the LC-17s and 18 from the USAF because of the safety and other factors that compel them to descend, "wrote Richards." Our testing activities will take place at LC-18. "

"For more than one Half a century, the twin towers of the SLC-17 stood on the horizon of the Cape Canaveral Spaceport ", said Frank DiBello, president and CEO of Space Florida, a state. agency responsible for attracting aerospace companies to Florida. "Together they hosted more than 300 launches and often marked the direction in which viewers would turn to witness the ongoing story."

"Tomorrow, these towers will be demolished," DiBello said in a statement on Wednesday. "This detonation will symbolize the renaissance and evolution of the Cape Canaveral Spatial Port, as we continue our transition to the planet's main center for commercial space activity. We look forward to doing even more." 39, history with the last renter, Moon Express, and our other partners in building the new bold future of the commercial space market. "

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