Endeavor Becomes First Vertical Shuttle Display
EXPOSITION PARK – Space, the final frontier. One made closer and more accessible by the revolutionary Space Transportation System (STS) or more colloquially, the Space Shuttle program.
Columbia, Challenger, Discovery, Atlantis, and Endeavour.
Only 5 complete space worthy Shuttles were ever built, completing 135 missions spread over 1,323 days. Missions that included launching the Hubble Space Telescope, and International Space Station.
The program couldn’t escape the perils of space exploration. Two Space Shuttles were tragically lost in accidents. Challenger exploded 73 seconds after liftoff in 1986 and Columbia disintegrated on reentry in 2003. 14 astronauts lost their lives.
Because of age, expense, and safety concerns, the Space Shuttles were decommissioned in 2011. The remaining three Shuttles were sent to Museums across the country with close ties to the Space Program.
Southern California has a long and storied history with Space Flight. The rockets used to take man to the moon were in part designed and tested in various cities around California. And every Space Shuttle was constructed in Palmdale, located in the Antelope Valley, and part of Los Angeles County.
The California Science Center was selected as a home for Endeavor to highlight the Southlands history in spaceflight and the Shuttle program specifically.
In 2012, Endeavour flew over Southern California atop a modified NASA 747 Shuttle Carrier Aircraft, with many thousands on the streets, atop hills, and rooftops, witnessing the majestic return “home” to Southern California for its final destination. The Shuttle landed at LAX, and was towed across the streets of Los Angeles, before settling in a temporary exhibit at the California Science Center.
On Wednesday, The California Science Center provided the first public view of Space Shuttle Endeavour in its permanent home and announced an opening date for its future air and space museum.
The Samuel Oschin Air and Space Center will open to the public Nov. 13, according to the science center.
Officials said the exhibit will be the only place in the world where visitors can view a complete, authentic space shuttle system in launch position. The display features the flown orbiter Endeavour attached to a pair of real solid rocket boosters and ET-94, the last remaining flight-qualified external tank.
The unveiling took place Wednesday morning at the California Science Center in Exposition Park, where Endeavour is displayed inside the Samuel Oschin Shuttle Gallery, the centerpiece of the $450 million Samuel Oschin Air and Space Center.
The shuttle stack stands nearly 200 feet tall, allowing visitors to walk beneath the orbiter’s main engines, view its open payload bay and ascend to elevated viewing platforms overlooking the spacecraft, according to officials.
The exhibit will also include a 140’ gantry style elevator to evoke the feeling of astronauts preparing for launch, a 115’ slide emulating the reentry of a space shuttle, and a replica flight deck replete with switches, lights, pedals, and joysticks, placing guests in the cockpit.
Construction of the Samuel Oschin Air and Space Center was completed in April, nearly four years after groundbreaking on the project in June 2022. The 200,000-square-foot addition nearly doubles the Science Center’s exhibit space and will house more than 100 aerospace artifacts and hands-on exhibits focused on aviation and space exploration, officials said.
In addition to the shuttle gallery, the facility will include the multi-level Korean Air Aviation Gallery and Kent Kresa Space Gallery.
“Through the development of the Samuel Oschin Air and Space Center, the California Science Center is fulfilling a decades-long dream,” President and CEO of the California Science Center Jeffrey N. Rudolph said in announcing completion of the building in April. “This amazing project significantly expands our ability to accomplish our mission, to stimulate curiosity and inspire science learning in everyone, on a scale and with an impact unlike anything in our history.”
He added that the facility “will stand as an enduring source of inspiration for generations of scientists, engineers and explorers.”
The facility was designed around the unprecedented vertical display of Endeavour, according to project architect Ted Hyman of ZGF Architects.
“At the outset of this project we challenged ourselves to achieve something that has never been done before: to design the only place in the world for the public to see a space shuttle in launch position,” Hyman said when construction was completed.
Endeavour was lifted into its permanent vertical configuration in 2024 following a six-month assembly process known as “Go for Stack.” The orbiter, which flew 25 NASA missions between 1992 and 2011, has been on public display at the Science Center since arriving in Los Angeles in 2012.
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