NASA Commentator: Piercing the pre-dawn skies, the space shuttle announcing its arrival at the launch site
with the signature sound of twin sonic booms having gone subsonic for the last time.
Having fired the imagination of a generation, a ship like no other, its place in history secured,
the space shuttle pulls into port for the last time.
Humanity has left Earth many times before from our Florida shoreline.
Some of the most inspiring missions of adventure began here at Kennedy Space Center and would
not have been successful without our hard work.
That work and expertise will always be a hallmark of our efforts here, though we are retooling
for the future.
Kennedy helped America take important steps before and now . . .
KELVIN MANNING We are getting ready to make our next giant
leap!
MANNING: We are remaking NASA's Kennedy Space Center
into the world's premiere multi-user spaceport.
Ultimately, launching missions beyond low-earth orbit and taking people to destinations far
beyond anywhere humans have gone before.
JANET PETRO: Making un-needed facilities available to the
commercial space industry is one of the best ways to enable this new industry.
We are also making the Kennedy Space Center more accessible to the entrepreneurs who are
already driving the next space age.
NARRATOR: It began with opening up facilities at Kennedy
to requests that would use them in new and different ways.
A team from Johnson Space Center is using a lunar simulation field to make free flights
of an autonomous lander at the shuttle runway. Aerospace companies are exploring the iconic
facility as the starting point and finish line of suborbital missions carrying experiments
and paying passengers into weightlessness.
PETRO: No one has ever tried to repurpose a major
installation like the Kennedy Space Center, but we are getting it done.
NARRATOR: Up at Launch Complex 39 and the Vehicle Assembly
Building area, crews got to work replacing infrastructure that was installed at the beginning
of the Space Age. The computers, wiring and cabling were cutting
edge 50 years ago, and got America to the moon.
Now though, the equipment was worn and obsolete. NARRATOR:
The changes reached deep into the heart of the landmark Vehicle Assembly Building. Rusted
pipes, corroded cables, antiquated data and electrical wiring were (or are being) removed.
Fashioning the crown jewel of the Kennedy Space Center into a facility capable of assembling
the next generation of American rockets, for both private companies and NASA missions.
SCOTT THURSTON: ON CAMERA
NASA began work on the Space Launch System design. A gigantic rocket capable of taking
our astronauts far beyond low Earth orbit.
With this 32-story super-rocket being built in the spirit of the Saturn V, we knew we
would be looking again at reaching far out into space. Asteroids and Mars are suddenly
within reach.
But we knew it would also take a special launch complex to handle it.
We didn't have to look far for the foundation. Launch Complex 39B, right here.
NARRATOR: Cranes and workers descended on Launch Complex
39B and began their critical work.
They took down the fixed service structure and rotating service structure built for the
space shuttle.
The salt air on the coast of Atlantic Ocean took its toll on the proud structures, but
workers soon took to restoring their glory.
They sandblasted fuel and support lines that ran from storage tanks to the pad and to the
spacecraft.
As in the VAB, conduits and cables were torn out and replaced with modern electronics and
capabilities undreamt of previously.
SCOTT WILSON: While they are getting ready for our new rocket,
engineers and technicians at the other end of the space center, in a place we call the
Operations and Checkout Building, are getting ready for a new spacecraft.
This is the high bay, the pristine work area where engineers and technicians just finished
assembling the Orion spacecraft for its first test.
It's kind of a garage for space ships.
Remember that part about making the VAB able to handle more than one rocket and spacecraft?
That's what we're doing here, too.
Lockheed Martin, who assembled Orion, can use this assembly area on other spacecraft
when it's not working on an Orion.
TIM DUNN It's good to think about the future and make
plans, but all of us out here knew we had to keep doing what we are here for, too. Launching
rockets. TIM DUNN
Although the shuttle retired, NASA never stopped exploring.
In fact, in many ways we picked up the pace.
We launched the huge Juno spacecraft to Jupiter, the first probe dispatched to the gas giant
since NASA's Galileo in 1989.
Kennedy's teams continued going to Vandenberg Air Force Base to launch Earth-observing missions.
And no one will ever forget the Curiosity rover we launched to Mars. Right now, that
car-sized laboratory is traversing the rust-colored soil of the red planet unlocking geologic
mysteries we didn't even know to ask about. NARRATOR:
Cargo resupply missions launching from Florida gave Kennedy its first look at its spaceport
destiny.
Rockets and spacecraft built by private companies went from experimental to operational. Their
launches became common sights.
Aboard the space station, crew members were able to unpack the cargo craft to find supplies
and the all-important scientific experiments they would operate.
The space station's needs are also driving a new approach to doing business with America's
aerospace firms.
An approach that is presenting Kennedy with new opportunities.
Kathy Lueders We've spent three years in close partnership
with some of the industry's largest companies and most-promising start-ups to design the
next generation of spacecraft that will carry our astronauts to low-Earth orbit.
Bob Cabana We’ve made the initial transition to become
a multi-user spaceport, but we still have a ways to go to fully implement our vision.
We are solidifying our position as America’s preeminent spaceport, supporting both government
and commercial launches, to and from low earth orbit, and beyond. A spaceport worthy of all
those who have gone before, and of those who will one day take us on a journey to Mars
and beyond.