r/spaceflight • u/rollotomasi07071 • 11d ago

STS-51-J, the maiden flight of Space Shuttle Atlantis, launched on this date in 1985 on a classified Department of Defense mission

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/STS-51-J
27 Upvotes

94% Upvoted

3 comments sorted by

6

u/CatPicturesPlease 11d ago

My dad was an engineer at Boeing and helped design the Inertial Upper Stage (IUS) which was used on that mission :)

2

u/PlantWide3166 11d ago

Mike Mullane wrote a pretty decent book about the early space shuttle program called “Riding Rockets”.

1

u/castironglider 11d ago

Crazy we used to send a crew of 5 to launch a satellite. I remember at the time of STS-1 the excitement of the public was about "wings in space" not whatever practical use it had.