Status
Success
Rocket
Vehicles
Mission Details
STS-32
The primary objectives of the mission were to deploy the Syncom IV-F5 defense communications satellite (also known as Leasat 5),[2] and to retrieve NASA's Long Duration Exposure Facility (LDEF), whose retrieval had been delayed for 41⁄2 years by scheduling changes and the Challenger disaster of 1986. Syncom IV-F5 was deployed on the second flight day, and a third-stage Minuteman solid perigee kick motor propelled it into a geosynchronous orbit. Dunbar retrieved the LDEF on the fourth day of the flight using the shuttle's Remote Manipulator System.
Payloads: 1
Total Mass: 12,014.0 kg
Low Earth Orbit
Location
LC-39A, Kennedy Space Center, Florida, USA
Stats
1990
2nd orbital launch attempt
Space Shuttle
33rd mission
1st mission of 1990
32nd successful mission
8th consecutive successful mission