American space launch site at Cape Canaveral Air Force Station in Florida, United States
Space Launch Complex 17
[1]
[2]
(
SLC-17
), previously designated
Launch Complex 17
(
LC-17
), was a launch site at
Cape Canaveral Air Force Station
(CCAFS),
Florida
used for
Thor
and
Delta
launch vehicles launches between 1958 and 2011.
It was built in 1956 for use with the
PGM-17 Thor
missile, the first operational
ballistic missile
in the arsenal of the
United States
. More recently the launch complex has been used for vehicles in the
Delta
launch vehicle family, derived from the Thor missile, to launch probes to the
Moon
and planets, solar observatories and weather satellites.
SLC-17 features two
expendable launch vehicle
(ELV) launch pads,
17A
and
17B
. The pads were operated by the
45th Space Wing
and have supported more than 300
Department of Defense
,
NASA
and commercial missile and rocket launches. Following the last military launch, in August 2009, SLC-17A was withdrawn from use, and LC-17B was transferred to NASA (SLC-17B) for two remaining launches.
Pad 17A supported its first Thor missile launch on 3 August 1957, and Pad 17B supported its first Thor launch on 25 January 1957. The site was upgraded in the early 1960s to support a variety of more modern ELVs, which were derived from the basic Thor booster. The modern ELVs based on Thor came to be called the
Delta family
of launch vehicles.
Thirty-five early Delta rocket missions were launched from Complex 17 between the beginning of 1960 and the end of 1965. At that time the complex was operated by the
US Air Force
. The US Air Force transferred Launch Complex 17A to
NASA
(SLC-17A) in 1965, but the site was returned to the US Air Force in 1988 to support the
Delta II
program.
As Delta II launches continued over the next decades, Pad 17B was modified in 1997 to support a new, more powerful launch vehicle, the
Delta III
, which made its maiden flight from the complex on 26 August 1998. The launch ended in failure, as did a second launch the next year. After a third launch on 23 August 2000 placed a mass simulator into a lower than planned orbit, the program was abandoned.
Among the major NASA missions launched from the complex were the
Explorer
and
Pioneer
space probes, all of the
Orbiting Solar Observatories
, the
Solar Maximum Mission
, biological satellites (
Biosatellite program
), the
International Cometary Explorer
(ICE), the
TIROS
and
GOES
meteorology satellites, and the
Mars Exploration Rovers
Spirit
and
Opportunity
.
On 10 September 2011, a Delta II 7920H-10C made the final launch from SLC-17B, carrying NASA's
GRAIL
spacecraft. All remaining Delta II launches were made from
Vandenberg Air Force Base
in
California
.
At 11:00 UTC (7:00 a.m. EDT) on 12 July 2018, both launch towers had been demolished via controlled demolition to make way for
Moon Express
to build and test its lunar lander.
[3]
Notes
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]
References
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]
External links
[
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Launch sites
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Inactive
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Under construction
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Landing sites
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Related
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Thor and Delta rockets
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Rockets
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Delta
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Numerical
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Modern
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Export
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Launch sites
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Components
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First stages
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Upper Stages
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Engines
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Manufacturers
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Launches
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