STS-42

1992 American crewed spaceflight

STS-42
Spacecraft properties
Spacelab Module LM2 in Discovery's payload bay, serving as the International Microgravity Laboratory (IML).
Names	Space Transportation System-42

Mission type	Microgravity research
Operator	NASA
COSPAR ID	1992-002A
SATCAT no.	21846
Mission duration	8 days, 1 hour, 14 minutes, 44 seconds
Distance travelled	4,701,140 km (2,921,150 mi)
Orbits completed	129


Spacecraft	Space Shuttle Discovery
Launch mass	110,400 kg (243,400 lb)
Landing mass	98,924 kg (218,090 lb) ^[1]
Payload mass	13,066 kg (28,806 lb)


Crew
Crew size	7
Members	Ronald J. Grabe Stephen S. Oswald Norman Thagard William F. Readdy David C. Hilmers Roberta Bondar Ulf Merbold


Start of mission
Launch date	January 22, 1992, 14:52:33 UTC
Rocket	Space Shuttle Discovery
Launch site	Kennedy Space Center, LC-39A
Contractor	Rockwell International


End of mission
Landing date	January 30, 1992, 16:07:17 UTC
Landing site	Edwards Air Force Base, Runway 22


Orbital parameters
Reference system	Geocentric orbit
Regime	Low Earth orbit
Perigee altitude	291 km (181 mi)
Apogee altitude	307 km (191 mi)
Inclination	57.00°
Period	90.50 minutes

STS-42 mission patch Stephen S. Oswald, Roberta Bondar, Norman Thagard, Ronald J. Grabe, David C. Hilmers, Ulf Merbold, William F. Readdy Space Shuttle program ← STS-44 (44) STS-45 (46) →

STS-42 was a NASA Space Shuttle Discovery mission with the Spacelab module. Liftoff was originally scheduled for 8:45 EST (13:45 UTC) on January 22, 1992, but the launch was delayed due to weather constraints. Discovery successfully lifted off an hour later at 9:52:33 EST (14:52:33 UTC).^[1] The main goal of the mission was to study the effects of microgravity on a variety of organisms. The shuttle landed at 8:07:17 PST (16:07:17 UTC) on January 30, 1992, on Runway 22, Edwards Air Force Base, California.^[1] STS-42 was the first of two flights in 1992 of Discovery, the second of which occurred during STS-53, which launched on December 2, 1992. The mission was also the last mission of the Space Shuttle Discovery to have a seven-member crew until STS-82, which was launched on February 11, 1997.

Crew


Position	Astronaut
Commander	Ronald J. Grabe Third spaceflight
Pilot	Stephen S. Oswald First spaceflight
Mission Specialist 1	Norman Thagard Fourth spaceflight
Mission Specialist 2	William F. Readdy First spaceflight
Mission Specialist 3	David C. Hilmers Fourth and last spaceflight
Payload Specialist 1	Roberta Bondar, CSA Only spaceflight
Payload Specialist 2	Ulf Merbold, ESA Second spaceflight

Crew seating arrangements

Seat^[2]	Launch	Landing	Seats 1–4 are on the Flight Deck. Seats 5–7 are on the Middeck.
S1	Grabe	Grabe
S2	Oswald	Oswald
S3	Thagard	Hilmers
S4	Readdy	Readdy
S5	Hilmers	Thagard
S6	Bondar	Bondar
S7	Merbold	Merbold

Crew notes

The crew of STS-42 included West Germany's first astronaut, Ulf D. Merbold, who was making his second spaceflight, and Canada's first female astronaut, Roberta L. Bondar. In order to allow around-the-clock monitoring of experiments, the astronauts were divided into a red team and a blue team. Mary L. Cleave was originally selected to fly as Mission Specialist 3 for this mission but withdrew herself for personal reasons. She was replaced by Manley Lanier "Sonny" Carter Jr., who died 7 months prior the launch in a plane crash. David Hilmers was then chosen to replace him.

Mission highlights

STS-42 was launched on January 22, 1992, 9:52:33 a.m. EST. The launch was delayed by one hour due to weather constraints. The launch weight was 243,396 lb (110,403 kg).

Discovery carried into orbit the International Microgravity Laboratory-1 (IML-1), a pressurized crewed Spacelab module, to explore in depth the complex effects of weightlessness on living organisms and materials processing. The international crew, divided into Red and Blue teams, conducted experiments on the human nervous system's adaptation to low gravity and the effects of microgravity on other life forms such as shrimp eggs, lentil seedlings, fruit fly eggs and bacteria. Low gravity materials processing experiments included crystal growth from a variety of substances such as enzymes, mercury, iodine and a virus. Other payloads included 10 Get Away Special (GAS) canisters, a number of middeck payloads, two Shuttle Student Involvement Program (SSIP) experiments, and an Australian developed ultraviolet telescope Endeavour.^[3] Middeck payloads included Gelation of SOLS: Applied Microgravity Research (GOSAMR), Investigations into Polymer Membrane Processing (IPMP) and the Radiation Monitoring Experiment (RME-III).

The mission landed on January 30, 1992, 8:07:17 a.m. PST, Runway 22, Edwards Air Force Base, California, after being extended by a day for continued scientific experimentation. The rollout distance was 9,811 ft (2,990 m). The orbiter returned to Kennedy Space Center on February 16, 1992. The landing weight was 218,016 lb (98,890 kg).

Mission insignia

The four stars in the lower blue field and two stars in the upper blue field of the insignia symbolize the flight's numerical designation in the Space Transportation System's mission sequence. The single gold star above the horizon on the right is in honor of astronaut Manley Lanier "Sonny" Carter Jr., who was killed in the crash of Atlantic Southeast Airlines Flight 2311 in Brunswick, Georgia while on a commercial airplane traveling for NASA. Carter was originally assigned as a mission specialist on STS-42 at the time of his death.

References

^ ^a ^b ^c "STS-42" (PDF). NASA. September 2011. Retrieved February 8, 2022. This article incorporates text from this source, which is in the public domain.
^ "STS-42". Spacefacts. Retrieved February 26, 2014.
^ "Endeavour". sworld.com.au. Retrieved July 22, 2019.

External links

Wikimedia Commons has media related to STS-42.

NASA mission summary
STS-42 Press Kit
STS-42 Video Highlights Archived July 12, 2012, at the Wayback Machine

Space Shuttle Discovery (OV-103)

Completed flights

Status

Retired

On display

Steven F. Udvar-Hazy Center, Washington, D.C.

Destiny in Space (1994 documentary)

U.S. Space Shuttle missions

Completed
(crews)

1970s	1977 Approach and Landing Tests
1980s	1981 STS-1 STS-2 1982 STS-3 STS-4 STS-5 1983 STS-6 STS-7 STS-8 STS-9 1984 STS-41-B STS-41-C STS-41-D STS-41-G STS-51-A 1985 STS-51-C STS-51-D STS-51-B STS-51-G STS-51-F STS-51-I STS-51-J STS-61-A STS-61-B 1986 STS-61-C STS-51-L† 1988 STS-26 STS-27 1989 STS-29 STS-30 STS-28 STS-34 STS-33
1990s	1990 STS-32 STS-36 STS-31 STS-41 STS-38 STS-35 1991 STS-37 STS-39 STS-40 STS-43 STS-48 STS-44 1992 STS-42 STS-45 STS-49 STS-50 STS-46 STS-47 STS-52 STS-53 1993 STS-54 STS-56 STS-55 STS-57 STS-51 STS-58 STS-61 1994 STS-60 STS-62 STS-59 STS-65 STS-64 STS-68 STS-66 1995 STS-63 STS-67 STS-71 STS-70 STS-69 STS-73 STS-74 1996 STS-72 STS-75 STS-76 STS-77 STS-78 STS-79 STS-80 1997 STS-81 STS-82 STS-83 STS-84 STS-94 STS-85 STS-86 STS-87 1998 STS-89 STS-90 STS-91 STS-95 STS-88 1999 STS-96 STS-93 STS-103
2000s	2000 STS-99 STS-101 STS-106 STS-92 STS-97 2001 STS-98 STS-102 STS-100 STS-104 STS-105 STS-108 2002 STS-109 STS-110 STS-111 STS-112 STS-113 2003 STS-107† 2005 STS-114 2006 STS-121 STS-115 STS-116 2007 STS-117 STS-118 STS-120 2008 STS-122 STS-123 STS-124 STS-126 2009 STS-119 STS-125 STS-127 STS-128 STS-129
2010s	2010 STS-130 STS-131 STS-132 2011 STS-133 STS-134 STS-135

Cancelled

Orbiters

^† indicates failure missions.

v t e ← 1991 Orbital launches in 1992 1993 →
January	Kosmos 2175 STS-42 Kosmos 2176 Progress M-11 Kosmos 2177, Kosmos 2178, Kosmos 2179
February	Unnamed USA-78 Fuyo 1 Kosmos 2180 USA-79 Superbird B1, Arabsat 1C
March	Molniya 1-83 Kosmos 2181 Galaxy 5 Soyuz TM-14 STS-45
April	Kosmos 2182 Gorizont No.36L Kosmos 2183 USA-80 Kosmos 2184 Telecom 2B, Inmarsat-2 F4 Progress M-12 USA-81 Resurs-F2 No.8 Kosmos 2185
May	STS-49 Palapa B4 SROSS-C Kosmos 2186
June	Kosmos 2187, Kosmos 2188, Kosmos 2189, Kosmos 2190, Kosmos 2191, Kosmos 2192, Kosmos 2193, Kosmos 2194 EUVE Intelsat K Resurs-F1 No.55 STS-50 Progress M-13
July	Kosmos 2195 USA-82 SAMPEX USA-83 Kosmos 2196 INSAT-2A, Eutelsat-2 F4 Kosmos 2197, Kosmos 2198, Kosmos 2199, Kosmos 2200, Kosmos 2201, Kosmos 2202 Gorizont No.37L Geotail, DUVE Kosmos 2203 Soyuz TM-15 Kosmos 2204, Kosmos 2205, Kosmos 2206 Kosmos 2207 STS-46 (EURECA, TSS-1)
August	Molniya 1-84 FSW-13 TOPEX/Poseidon, Uribyol 1, S80/T Kosmos 2208 Optus B1 Progress M-14 Resurs-F1 No.54, Pion-Germes 1, Pion-Germes 2 Galaxy 1R Satcom C4
September	USA-84 Kosmos 2209 Hispasat 1A, Satcom C3 STS-47 Kosmos 2210 Mars Observer
October	FSW-14, Freja Foton No.8L DFS-Kopernikus 3 Molniya-3 No.50 Kosmos 2211, Kosmos 2212, Kosmos 2213, Kosmos 2214, Kosmos 2215, Kosmos 2216 Kosmos 2217 STS-52 (LAGEOS-2, CTA) Progress M-15 (Znamya-2) Galaxy 7 Kosmos 2218 Ekran-M No.15L
November	Resurs 500 Kosmos 2219 Kosmos 2220 MSTI-1 USA-85 Kosmos 2221 Kosmos 2222 Gorizont No.38L USA-86
December	Superbird A1 Molniya-3 No.56 STS-53 (USA-89, ODERACS) Kosmos 2223 Kosmos 2224 USA-87 Optus B2 Kosmos 2226 Kosmos 2225 Kosmos 2227 Kosmos 2228 Kosmos 2229
Launches are separated by dots ( • ), payloads by commas ( , ), multiple names for the same satellite by slashes ( / ). CubeSats are smaller. Crewed flights are underlined. Launch failures are marked with the † sign. Payloads deployed from other spacecraft are (enclosed in parentheses).