Known as the R40b, the engine was originally developed to allow shuttles to adjust their speed and direction while in orbit, helping the iconic spacecraft to deploy the Hubble Telescope and parts of the International Space Station.īefore the three surviving shuttles were sent to their final resting places at museums, NASA instructed technicians to strip them of thousands of important components. A Space Act Agreement signed in 2018 shows that the aerospace company wants to include a handful of the shuttle’s smaller orbital thrusters in a secret Department of Defense project.
Now yet more shuttle hardware is getting ready to fly again, also within Boeing's empire. This vehicle is designed to offer swift, aircraft-like access to space. An experimental autonomous Darpa spaceplane, called the Phantom Express, will also rely on a shuttle engine. Modified left-over shuttle engines will power NASA’s delayed Space Launch System (SLS), a giant launch vehicle intended for lunar missions and, eventually, Mars.
But the program isn’t dead yet: Many of its parts are popping up as zombie components in spacecraft now in development. Three spacecraft survive in retirement as specimens in museums around the country. In 2011, the storied space shuttle flew for the last time.
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