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| Mission Insignia |
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| Mission Statistics |
| Mission: | STS-9 |
| Shuttle: | Columbia |
| Launch Pad: | 39A |
| Launch: | November 28, 1983
16:00:00 UTC |
| Landing: | December 12, 1983
23:47:23 UTC
Edwards AFB, California, Runway 17 |
| Duration: | 10 days, 7 hours, 47 minutes, 24 seconds |
| Orbit Altitude: | 155 nautical miles |
| Orbit Inclination: | 57.0 degrees |
| Orbits: | 167 |
| Miles Traveled: | 4,295,853 miles |
Crew photo |
 L-R: Garriott, Lichtenberg, Shaw, Young, Merbold, Parker |
STS-9 (Spacelab 1) was a United States Space Shuttle mission, the 6th mission of the Columbia orbiter.
Crew
Backup Payload Specialists
Mission Parameters
Mission objective
For the STS-9 mission Columbia was once again back in orbit. The
launch occurred at ll a.m. EST, Nov. 28, 1983, after a 2-month delay
because of a nozzle problem with one of the SRBs. This necessitated
moving the vehicle back to the Vehicle Assembly Building where the
nozzle was replaced.
The 6-member crew -- a manned space flight record at the time --
included John W. Young, commander, on his second Shuttle flight;
Brewster H. Shaw, pilot; Owen Garriott and Robert A. Parker, both
mission specialists; and Byron K. Lichtenberg and Ulf Merbold payload
specialists -- the first two non-astronauts to fly on the Shuttle.
Merbold, a citizen of West Germany, also was the first foreign
citizen to participate in a Shuttle flight. Lichtenberg was a
researcher at Massachusetts Institute of Technology.
The mission was devoted entirely to Spacelab l, a joint
NASA/European Space Agency (ESA) program designed to demonstrate the
ability to conduct advanced scientific research in space, with
astronauts and payload specialists working in the Spacelab module and
coordinating their efforts with scientists at the Marshall Payload
Operations Control Center (POCC) then located at the Johnson Space
Center. Funding for Spacelab l was provided by ESA.
The crew was divided into two teams, each working 12-hour shifts for
the duration of the mission. Young, Parker and Merbold formed the
Red Team, while Shaw, Garriott and Lichtenberg made up the Blue Team.
Usually, the commander and the pilot team members were assigned to
the flight deck, while the mission and payload specialists worked
inside the Spacelab.
Seventy-two scientific experiments were carried out in the fields of
atmospheric and plasma physics, astronomy, solar physics, material sciences, technology, life sciences and Earth observations. The
effort went so well that the mission was extended an additional day
to 10 days, making it the longest duration Shuttle flight to date.
The Spacelab l mission was highly successful, having proved the
feasibility of the concept of carrying out complex experiments in
space using non-NASA persons trained as payload specialists in
collaboration with a POCC. Moreover, the Tracking and Data Relay
Satellite, now fully operational, was able to relay vasts amounts of
data through its ground terminal to the POCC.
Columbia landed on Runway 17 at Edwards AFB, on Dec. 8, 1983, at
3:47 p.m. PST, completing 166 orbits and traveling 4.3 million miles.
Columbia was ferried back to KSC on Dec. 15.
Mission insignia
The major Spacelab 1 is depicted in the cargo bay of the
Columbia. The nine stars and the path of the orbiter tell the flight's
numerical designation in the Space Transportation System's mission
sequence.
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