Plans were well underway to launch the Space Shuttle at Vandenberg in the early 1980s. The shuttle was what a rocket could never be: A flying aircraft with a human pilot. //

After the Challenger disaster, the entire program underwent an audit, and it was discovered that the SLC-6 launch pad — recycled from previous canceled Air Force projects like the never-launched Manned Orbital Laboratory — would be destroyed by the force of the first shuttle launch. The effect would have been similar to the April 2023 SpaceX Starship launch in Texas that hurled concrete powder miles from the launch site and damaged the launch vehicle. //

That was all in the future as a Boeing 747 jet carried a Space Shuttle to Vandenberg (then an Air Force base) for a promotional look at what was hoped would be a West Coast base of operations for the shuttle. If my recollection is correct, there has never been a manned flight launched from Vandenberg. In a full circle moment, SLC-6 launch pad is now leased for an expansion of the SpaceX Falcon program. The Falcon is a smaller rocket, carrying about 25% of the shuttle’s maximum. //

Reporters and photographers line up to watch and photograph the space shuttle and 747. The plane and cargo circled over Santa Maria and Lompoc before landing on time at the base. The brand new space shuttle Discovery visited Vandenberg Air Force Base on Nov. 6, 1983. Tony Hertz Telegram-Tribune file //

The newest orbiter will leave Vandenberg on Tuesday for Kennedy Space Center in Florida, where it will fly at least three missions before returning for the first Vandenberg launch. Between five and 10 annual missions may be launched from Vandenberg. The craft weighs 148,000 pounds empty and will weigh about 210,00 pounds in flight. It is 122 feet long and 78 feet wide; about the size of a DC-9 commercial airliner. It is removed or placed aboard the 747 with a bridge-like crane called a mating facility. The Air Force has spent $2.5 billion to build the space shuttle launch complex. Construction included the pouring of 250,000 cubic yards of concrete — enough to build a 25-mile four lane freeway — the use of 9,000 tons of steel reinforcing bar and 15,000 tons of structural steel. The latter would build a 120-story office building. Shuttles launched from Vandenberg will be put on polar, or south to north, orbits; Florida launches are put on equatorial orbits.

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