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JOHN C. STENNIS SPACE CENTER
Traditional Center Roles and Responsibilities
Formerly designated the National Space Technology
Laboratories (NSTL), the Center was renamed the John C.
Stennis Space Center by Executive Order signed by President
Reagan on May 20, 1988.
In October 1961, the federal government announced its
selection of a site in Hancock County, Mississippi, to
locate the nation's test facility for static firing of the
Saturn V rocket engines. The selection of this site for the
Mississippi Test Facility, as NSTL was first named, was a
logical and practical one. The area offered ample land for
construction of the huge test facilities and had water
access for shipping massive rocket stages and barge loads of
propellants.
NSTL's first assignment was to flight certify all of the
first and second stages of the Saturn V rocket for the
Apollo program. The program began with a static test firing
on April 23, 1966, and continued in the early 1970s. In
all, 27 Saturn stages were tested and all performed
successfully, including those used for Apollo 11, the first
lunar landing mission.
A new chapter in NSTL's history was opened with the first
test of a Space Shuttle Main Engine in June 1975. The main
engine test program is expected to continue into the 1990s
and beyond, supporting shuttle missions and the planned
space station. NSTL's missions also expanded during the
transition between the Apollo and Space Shuttle programs,
when the installation evolved into a multiagency,
multidiscipline facility comprised of a number of federal
and state agencies which are engaged in space and
environmental programs and the national defense.
The current missions of the Stennis Space Center are to
support the development of the Space Shuttle Main Engines;
to conduct research and development in remote sensing and
other space applications; and to manage the 13,480-acre
installation and provide support services to resident
agencies.
The Space Shuttle Main Engine test program has been underway
since 1975. All the main engines used to power the orbiter
during the first 8? minutes of flight are tested here before
an actual launch. Research and development engines designed
for groundtesting purposes only are also tested continuously
to refine and improve the performance of flight engines.
Another Stennis Space Center mission is to provide technical
and institutional support to the 18 resident agencies and
university elements located here. These federal and state
agencies are primarily involved in environmental and
oceanographic programs on national and international levels.
g mission.The Sciences and Technology Laboratory () is the
primary research and develop-ment organization of the
Stennis Space Center. The laboratory was established in
1970 to develop new technology for observing the Earth and
its resources. STL advances new remote data collection and
analysis concepts, and provides a logical transition from
basic research through applications development to
commercialization of space remote sensing technology.
Laboratory personnel develop and test airborne prototypes of
advanced remote sensing instruments as proofs of concept for
orbital instruments.
The STL is currently adapting remote sensor technology to
support rocket engine testing and Shuttle launch and landing
operations.
The STL is comprised of scientific and techni-cal personnel
working in such fields as mathe-matical modeling, forestry,
geology, urban geography and archaeology. STL scientists
have close ties with the academic and indust-rial remote
sensing communities, enabling the laboratory to be fully
attuned to current trends. Also, its co-location with other
scienti-fic and technical agencies fosters cooperative R&D
activities. One goal of the laboratory is to develop
advanced capabilities to remotely examine and predict
changes in Earth proces-ses, especially those caused by
natural and human-induced disturbances. The STL also
develops advanced data processing systems, comprised of
state-of-art hardware and spatial data management and
analysis software, to address complex scientific and
administrative information extraction requirements.
JOHN C. STENNIS SPACE CENTER
Supporting Roles For Space Station Freedom
The John C. Stennis Space Center's (SSC) involvement in the
Space Station Freedom program includes promoting commercial
participation in remote sensing opportunities on board the
station, performing user requirements and station
utilization studies for Space Station Program Office working
groups, and development of a payload simulator.
The Space Station Freedom assignments at Stennis Space
Center are being carried out by the Science and Technology
Laboratory, the installation's research and technology
development organization.
Stennis Space Center has conducted NASA outreach activities
designed to inform, stimulate, encourage and facilitate U.S.
industrial participation in NASA programs. In this effort,
an information base developed at Stennis Space Center is
used to provide technical assessments to U.S. industry
regarding commercial remote sensing opportunities on Space
Station Freedom.
A major portion of Stennis Space Center's out-reach activity
and station planning was preparation for the Space Station
Freedom Users Workshop held in Denver, Colo-rado in October
1988. Sponsored by NASA's Office of Space Station and the
Office of Com-mercial Programs, the industry-oriented
workshop was organized to define and encour-age commercial
activities and to elicit U.S. industry requirements in their
anticipated utilization of Freedom.
One of the concepts proposed for Space Station Freedom is
the Earth Observation Accom-modation Facility. The
advantage of such a facility on the station will be in
providing a testbed where sensors may be placed, tested,
refined, retested and ultimately customized for specific
application. This facility has evolved from commercial
space station user work-shops, outreach activities, and
contractor studies. Stennis Space Center will continue to
conceptualize and detail the design of the fa-cility to
conform to existing baseline station parameters, user
requirements, and hard-ware and assembly procedures.
Stennis Space Center has been assisting several station
working groups with generic remote sensing accommodations
analysis and in defining user requirements for workstations
on Space Station Freedom. Node utilization studies are also
being conducted by Stennis Space Center in support of the
program.
The Space Station Freedom Payload Simulator is a software
package written entirely in the Ada programming language
that supports space station program activities. The
simu-lator, developed and maintained at Stennis Space
Center, presently resides on computer systems at the Johnson
Space Center, Goddard Space Flight Center, and Stennis Space
Center.
The simulator enables a principal investigator to acquire
information and test specific condi-tions that are likely to
occur during the actual operation of experiments.
The purpose of the payload simulator is to support the Space
Station Freedom effort by providing tests of the network
communication on the Data Management System (DMS) testbed at
JSC, and the Platform Management System (PMS) at GSFC.
The simulator will support the implementa-tion of the
telescience concept in Space Station Freedom payload
development and operations as well as provide a training
tool for payload design and operation. Also, the payload
simulator will provide NASA with informa-tion and experience
in the development of software in Ada for real-time
applications.
Potential users of the payload simulator ser-vices are other
NASA program office Space Station Freedom activities, other
U.S. govern-ment Space Station Freedom partners and support
contractors, international Space Station Freedom
participants, and U.S. com-mercial Space Station Freedom
partners and participants.