Hi there it's me Tim Dodd, the Everyday Astronaut here at Kennedy Space Center Visitor's Complex
to teach you guys a little bit about the basics of rocket vocabulary.
We're literally just going to teach you the difference between a rocket, and the payload
it's carrying, and what a capsule looks like and what a Space Shuttle is.
It's really not as complicated as it sounds, I promise, check this out.
Welcome to this episode of "A Beginner's Guide to Rocket Vocabulary."
Now if you've wanted to learn about rockets or spaceflight but you don't even know where
to begin, well guess what!
You just found it!
So first things first, let's define two things.
There's the launch vehicle and its payload.
Or you might also hear someone say a rocket and a spacecraft.
Same thing.
The launch vehicle (or rocket) is just the thing that takes something to space.
Think of it as a delivery truck.
It has one job, to get its payload up into space.
Now it might be somewhere close, like low Earth orbit, or it might be something really
far away like Mars or Saturn!
All together, there's been a ton of rockets.
But here’s a quick list of some of the more famous rockets throughout history.
There’s the grandfather of modern rockets, the V2, then there’s Redstone, the Atlas,
the Titan, Space Shuttle, the Saturn V, the Soyuz, the Delta, and the Falcon 9.
Woo!
So why are there so many different rockets?
It comes down to which rocket is right for the job.
Quite simply put, the bigger the rocket, the bigger the payload can be.
But you don’t want to buy the wrong rocket for the job.
There's many considerations that come into play including price, performance and reliability.
Ok.Rockets. Check!
Now for the thing that goes on top of the rocket, the payload (or spacecraft).
A spacecraft is defined as a vehicle designed to fly in outer space.
This could be a communication satellite, or an Earth observation satellite, or a cargo
vessel, or a crewed (not crude) vehicle.
To make this easy, let’s look at all the crewed spacecrafts from history.
Spoiler Alert, there’s only about 7 (ish) vehicles that have ever taken people to space.
And 4 of those have come from the United States.
Let’s take a closer look at those 4 to see you how easy it is to see the entire history
of the United State’s human spaceflight program .
In 1961, we started flying astronauts aboard the Mercury Capsule, which was the first vehicle
to launch a United States astronaut to space and could only carry one astronaut at a time.
There were only 6 Mercury capsules flown with an astronaut on board, with the last flight
being in 1963.
In 1965, we started flying astronauts aboard the Gemini capsule, which could carry two
astronauts to space at a time.
There would be a total of 10 Gemini capsules that would fly with humans on board, with
the last flight in 1966.
In 1968 we started flying astronauts aboard the famous Apollo capsule, which could carry
three astronauts to space at a time.
The Apollo capsule is what took humans to the moon, so it’s pretty awesome.
There were a total of 15 Apollo capsules that would fly with humans on board, with the last
flight in 1975.
Lastly in 1981, we started flying astronauts aboard the Space Shuttle.
The icon Space Shuttle could carry up to 8 astronauts and is perhaps the most confusing
rocket to define.
First, it’s official program name was the Space Transportation System, which you may
often hear referred to as STS followed by the mission number
(and don’t even get me started on those confusing mission numbers).
The next item of confusion is what a Space Shuttle actually is.
Well, the space shuttle is actually composed of three main things.
The orbiter, the external fuel tank and the solid rocket boosters.
So in this case, this entire thing is the rocket while just the orbiter is the spacecraft.
Sigh.
Ok, well anyway, the Space Shuttle stopped flying in 2011 after 135 missions and is currently
as of the making of this video, the last vehicle to ever have flown Astronauts from the United
States, but that’s going to change soon.
So that’s it!
Those are the ONLY vehicles to launch Astronauts to space from the United States.
Pretty easy huh?
Currently there’s 2 or 3 satellites launched into space on any given week by various countries,
but there’s only a handful of crewed launches per year.
So to summarize, there’s rockets and there’s the payload.
So you might have SpaceX’s Falcon 9 rocket launching a Dragon Capsule or perhaps a communications
satellite or you might see United Launch Alliance’s launch their Atlas V rocket with a Cygnus
Capsule resupplying the International Space Station or perhaps a military satellite.
Ok let’s pop back to Kennedy Space Center to see some examples!
So behind me is the Rocket Garden here at Kennedy Space Center.
Rocket Garden.
Someone should take a picture gardening in the rocket garden...
So here we have the Redstone rocket with the Mercury capsule on top and over here we have
an Atlas rocket with a Mercury capsule on top.
Here we see a Titan rocket with a Gemini capsule on top as its payload.
Over here is a Saturn 1B rocket with the Apollo capsule as its payload.
Now behind me is the beloved Space Shuttle orbiter.
Now notice I just said orbiter and not just Space Shuttle.
This is the business end of a Saturn V rocket.
This is a Titan rocket.
These are Atlas rockets.
If you ever need someone to tell you what rockets are, that's this guy, that's me Mr.
Rocket Guy.
What's the rocket?
It's a Juno.
And this is a Saturn 1B.
I went for a little jog, why did I do that?
Weeee!
Okkkkkk enough goofing around.
I like how half the time I was wearing a space suit and half the time I wasn't with no explanation.
Talk about continuity errors!
Make sure and subscribe so you know when I continue “A Beginner’s Guide to Rocket Vocabulary"
If you have any questions about today’s video or ideas for future videos,
make sure and leave those in the comments below.
A big shout out to my Patreon Supporters for helping make this video and that road trip
down to Florida possible.
If you want to help support this show please visit Patreon.com/EverydayAstronaut (THANK YOU)
And lastly a big thank you to Kennedy Space Center Visitor’s Complex for letting me
run around like a goofball all day.
Seriously, thank you.
Well that does it for me, I’m Tim Dodd the Everyday Astronaut, bringing space down to
Earth for everyday people.