Sat, Jun 06, 2009
First Launch Scheduled for August
By Wes Oleszewski
On Wednesday June, 3rd another in a string of modifications to
launch pad 39B at the Kennedy Space Center took place. In
preparation for the upcoming Ares I-X launch, scheduled to take
place in late August, a Space Shuttle service component was
removed from the pad's Fixed Service Structure.
The Gaseous Oxygen Vent Hood or GOX Hood was removed from the
service tower by means of a crane. Although a critical Shuttle
component GOX hood, which allows venting of the External Tank's
liquid oxygen while at the same time preventing ice build-up, the
hood will not be used in Ares I-X operations.
Once removed from the service structure, the GOX Hood and its
swing arm were placed on trailers. The components will be trucked
to a nearby storage area and kept as spares until the end of the
Space Shuttle program. What will become of the components after the
shuttle has been retired, has not been decided.
These modifications are a part of preparing Pad 39B for the Ares
I series of launch vehicles. Future modifications will
include the removal of the Crew Access Arm and White Room. Plans
eventually call for demolition of the pad's Rotating Service
Structure and Fixed Service structure in order to return to the
"Clean Pad" configuration that was used in the Apollo era.
Noteworthy is the fact that the Fixed Service Structure itself is
actually made up of the top dozen levels of an original Apollo
Launch Umbilical Tower.
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