In September 1969, several months after the Apollo 11 lunar landing, President Richard M. Nixon established the Space Task Force to chart NASA's path for the decades to come. This imaginative vision was shattered less than six months later when, on January 13, 1970, NASA Administrator Dr. Thomas Paine announced that, owing to funding cuts, only the reusable Space Shuttle could be afforded -- there would be no space station, no return to the Moon, and no missions to Mars. This is a story never before told about the missions and technologies that NASA had begun to plan but never fully realized. The book is a companion to the author's previous two works on the Space Shuttle. Whereas the first two books showed how the Space Shuttle flew in space and what the program accomplished, this book explains what more the Space Shuttle could have achieved and how the space transportation system could have further matured if circumstances had been otherwise. A final chapter also discusses howsome of these plans might be resurrected in future programs.

Tells the story of a grand space program that might have been enabled by the Space Shuttle but never was Provides examples of upgrades that would have enhanced the External Tank, Solid Rocket Boosters and Orbiter Illustrated with many technical drawings and pictures extracted from NASA technical papers

Autorentext
Giuseppe De Chiara: Giuseppe De Chiara was born in Naples (Italy) in 1968. He is an accomplished aerospace professional who has been employed in the European space industry for 25 years. He began his career as a designer of Parabolic Flights facilities designer and later transitioned to the ISS Program as a Training Manager and Operations Leader. De Chiara currently works as a System Engineer and Technical Manager. His professional life as an engineer and architect has nourished his early passion for illustration. The Illustration has deepened his professional experience. He has illustrated several articles since 2010 with the noted aerospace author Dwayne A. Day. Additionally, he has been a coauthor of four scientific papers dating from 2003 to 2012. De Chiara has contributed with his artworks to several aerospace books like the ones by the late Steve Pace. In 2016 Giuseppe De Chiara teamed up with Michael H. Gorn to realize several books as the acclaimed "Spacecraft: 100 Iconic Rockets, Shuttles, and Satellites That Put Us in Space" released in 2018 and the book "X-Planes from the X-1 to the X-60: An Illustrated History" released by Springer in 2021. Davide Sivolella: Davide Sivolella is an aerospace engineer based in the UK with professional experience spanning the airline and civil aircraft manufacturing industries. Fascinated by flight from an early age—particularly by spacecraft—he earned Bachelor’s and Master’s degrees in Aerospace Engineering from the Polytechnic of Turin (Italy), followed by a PgCert in Advanced Mechanical Engineering from Cranfield University (UK) and a Professional Diploma in Aviation Finance and Leasing from Dublin City College (Ireland). Born in July 1981, just months after Columbia’s maiden flight, he developed a special fondness for the Space Shuttle program. This passion led him to author several well-received books published by Springer-Praxis, including To Orbit and Back Again, The Space Shuttle Program: Technologies and Accomplishments, and The Untold Stories of the Space Shuttle Program. He also wrote Space Mining and Manufacturing: Off-World Resources and Revolutionary Engineering Techniques, offering a compelling vision of how space-based mining and manufacturing could become key to Earth’s economic future. Beyond his professional pursuits, Davide is an avid reader with interests spanning cosmology to philosophy, an enthusiastic cook, and a keen traveller who enjoys exploring new places worldwide.

Inhalt
Chapter 1: Space Shuttle 101.- Chapter 2: Making the most of the External Tank.- Chapter 3: Boosting the boosters.- Chapter 4: Improving performance.- Chapter 5: Outposts for the development of space.- Chapter 6: Orbital hopping.- Chapter 7: Unflown satellite servicing capabilities.- Chapter 8: In-space assembly: a potential not fully exploited.- Chapter 9: Factories in space.- Chapter 10: The unfulfilled potential of the External Tank.- Chapter 11: Space Shuttle freighter.- Chapter 12: The quest for a worthy successor.- Chapter 13: An impossible schedule.- Chapter 14: Space Shuttle and Skylab: a missed opportunity.- Chapter 15: Unflown science.- Chapter 16: Space Shuttle in Uniform: A lost collaboration.- Chapter 17: Too high a dream?.