Jul 1 1997
From The Space Library
Space Shuttle Columbia lifted off from Kennedy Space Center (KSC) in Cape Canaveral, Florida. Commander James D. Halsell Jr. called Mission STS-94 a "once-in-a-career opportunity" for the seven-person crew, the same crew that had embarked upon Mission STS-83 in April 1997. NASA had cut short Mission STS-83 because of a fuel cell problem. The reflight gave NASA officials and the Shuttle crew a chance to undertake the experiments planned for the original mission, including testing hardware and procedures planned for the International Space Station. NASA was able to launch Columbia just 84 days after bringing the Shuttle home, at a cost of about 20 percent of the amount needed to set off a new Shuttle mission. The crew planned to carry out the original 33 experiments over the course of the 16-day science mission. Mission STS-94, NASA clarified, involved the same vehicle, crew, Microgravity Science Laboratory payload, and experiment schedule as the recalled mission. The mission was the first in the 36-year history of unpiloted spaceflight in which the same crew flew together in space more than once.
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