NASA Abandoned A Spacecraft in Orbit for 5 Years. When It Came Home It Surprised Them! 

I feel that passive orbit stabilization deserves an exhaustive explanation video.

Hi Scott! FYI: Lockheed Martin has one of the few space environmental effects labs in the world in Palo Alto, including 2 atomic oxygen chambers, one of which was designed and built by yours truly. We also do UV, ESD, and electron/proton radiation in that lab. Hit me up if you'd like to know more or look into arranging a tour!

I worked many months of 60 hour weeks on Pad A activation to get that thing back on STS-32. It was close; a schedule that couldn’t be delayed because payload was going to re-enter but we barely made it.

I was in the B-2 test team at Edwards when the Shuttle landed there with LDEF aboard. When the Shuttle Transporter 747 and Shuttle (still carrying LDEF) taxied out for takeoff we were watching from our taxiway gate about midway down runway 22. It was the heaviest Shuttle ever carried. When we saw the dust kick up as the pilot went to takeoff power we were shocked how slow the acceleration was at brake release. When that pair went by us it still looked way too slow. We knew that 747 was totally committed, fly or die. They'd already stopped all vehicle traffic on the main road off the end of Rwy 22. That 747 used every inch of the 15,000ft runway when the mains finally left the ground. The gear immediately began retraction and the pilot brought it up to only like 200 ft or so then kept it there. Skimming the bushes just gathering speed for a few miles. Finally almost out by Rosamond Lake we saw it finally start gaining altitude and beginning the turn to swing around to the east. That was the wildest Shuttle carrier takeoff we ever saw.

Looking at the "after" photos, this was probably one of the most important orbital experiments ever done. The delay was a big bonus.

Can definitely put this mission in the "Things Kerbal Space Program Can't Teach You" file.

I was the project manager for a payload that was in the cargo bay for the recovery flight. It was called the Interim Operational Contamination Monitor. It was there because they were concerned about any contamination IDEF received after recovery. One thing that I have never heard mentioned was what happened to the remaining foil after the Mylar was gone. The bay had a positive pressure in it to keep out any "dirt" after landing. They had a technician put some equipment in the bay to measure the humidity and such on the flight back to Kennedy. She entered through the airlock. When she opened the door a lot of the foil broke into tiny pieces and flew all over the place. My payload had pieces all over it, maybe because it was in the front of the bay close to the door. This stuff was really thin. If you tried to pick it up with your fingers it just disengaged.

My dad is one of many scientists who would thank you. He had the Thiokol solid rocket propellant experiment, which I think I saw a photo of towards the end (the rubber matrix was dyed green if it was "safe" - they left out one of the chemicals so it wouldn't burn in order to perform physical stress tests like twisting, squeezing, shear force, or, in this case, longterm storage in space.) Dad's sample came back with some impressive micrometeorite craters. Come to think of it, that data was probably used for Magellan, one of the last missions he worked on before retiring: it had a big ol' star 48 solid rocket motor that had to sit idle for a year and however many months it took to get to Venus, and I think Dad said he helped design the redundant firing system- another small charge -that would fire it up when the time came.

The deterioration looks much like Walmart garden furniture after a season or two.

The passive orbit stabilization stuff is really cool.

This video makes me so happy. As a young kid, I would watch the IMAX movie The Dream is Alive on repeat. I will never forget Walter Cronkite's narration about LDEF... "The LDEF satellite weighs 10 tons and is the size of a school bus. It carries 57 experiments - the work of more than 200 scientists from 8 countries. LDEF will stay up here for more than a year exposing various materials to the vacuum of space." That movie helped inspire me to work in aerospace.

A friend has a piece of the LDEF. Gifted to him by a relative who was a researcher at NASA in the 60’s and 70’s. It was always an interesting object but to think it led to the ISS really makes it extra special.

"Presumably by the time it came home it was the longer term exposure facility" ya nasa has that kind of dry sense of humor

In college I worked summers at Space Camp and watched the I-Max film, “The Dream Is Alive”, many times. This film featured the release of the LDEF satellite. I got pretty good with my Walter Cronkite impression saying, “The LDEF satellite WEIGHS 10 TONS, and IS the SIZE of a SCHOOL bus.” A couple of years later, I was in the Air Force doing some environmental monitoring experiments around launch pads in Cape Canaveral. We had some space in an old hanger at Cape Canaveral AFS, and we noticed this big enclosed trailer in the hanger bay. Since the trailer had some windows we peered inside, and to our amazement, it was the LDEF satellite sitting inside. Since the others were familiar with "The Dream Is Alive" we were joking around saying things like, "Wow! That's the size of a school bus!" and "I bet that thing must weigh 10 tons!"

Thank you for mentioning the outgassing from LDEF. I was responsible for analyzing some Gallium-Arsenide semiconductor samples that had been on it post-recovery, and if there had been any changes in their composition or electro-optical properties during their time in space they were masked by that.

My PhD was all based on the retrieval of LDEF. I was doing the preliminary work in anticipation but there was a graph on the wall showing altitude vs time with a line at the point at which it would probably be impossible to retrieve. The extrapolation did not look good so I was very happy when it was successfully retrieved. I then had the wrinkled silver thermal protection panels that you see in many photos plus our actual experiment of layered aluminium foils which are the rectangles split into triangles (Micro Abrasion Package). My PhD was determining the probability of penetrating a aluminium sheet of a specific thickness per unit time in a specific orientation. Predictably the leading side (running into the rain) had far more impacts, the sides less, back even less but the space facing and earth facing least of all as there were no orbits that these could come from so they required a one off source. The wrinkled silver panels were not of much use as they were a multi layer plastic + metal layer which had different behaviour with temperature and degraded with time. Also the multi layers caused some complicated impacts and when taken together I could not get much useful data from them.

Awesome demonstration of the versatility of the Shuttle... it could take this giant thing up to space, leave it there for several years, launch another satellite then rendezvous with it on the same trip to bring it back down to earth safely.

Just a perfect example of why your channel is great. Super interesting yet obscure space history!

Currently designing a CubeSat with a tether and we are really having to worry about micrometeoroid impacts, and space debris as well as erosion from the plasma that’s up there. Some pretty wild ideas getting thrown around for how to deal with those right now in our mission.

So glad you covered LDEF. My first science job involved cataloging micrometeorite impact craters on one of the forward facing panels and measuring them so we could characterize the mass distribution of micrometeorites and help with meteorite risk analysis for the space station. I thought it was really neat just to carefully disassemble, section off, and examine something that had been in space so long.

Hi Scott - Nice piece on the LDEF mission. One thing you did not mention was the tomato seed experiment. One of the major seed companies supplied NASA with an amount of tomato seeds that went up on the LDEF. When the seeds returned scientists then planted the seeds and checked their growth for any abnormalities. The fun part, which allowed the general public to be a part of the experiment, could apply and receive a packet of the “space seeds” to plant and try to grow “space tomatoes”. Of course, the conspiracy folks said that the seeds were unsafe and the tomatoes would be poisonous and should not be eaten. Go figure! Pete

I had seen the pictures once or twice but had never known what the satelite was actually about, this was crazy informative, thank you!

Think what you will about the shuttle, but being able to bring stuff back was always a nice feature.

@<a href="#" class="seekto" data-time="589">9:49</a>ff Rather 'cool' seeing the tires light up due to heating upon landing in the IR film.

In the early 1990s I helped design a linear accelerator facility for Japan to do materials research. Two things make it relevant here: First,the experiment chamber routinely achieved pressures at least two orders of magnitude lower than is typical in low Earth orbit. (A hundred times fewer molecules per unit volume.) And second, one of the beam sources was monoatomic oxygen. So no, the vacuum in near space at orbital altitude is not “a more perfect vacuum than anything we can make in vacuum chambers on the Earth.”

This is one of my favourite things you've covered. Not something that's common knowledge for laypeople, but super interesting and highly relevant to everything that's going on at the moment. Plus space history is awesome. Thanks Scott!

Great job Scott. You took information that could be a “yawn-er” and made it fascinating! Thanks; I remember when “the bus” went up and had forgotten all about it! Again, good job!

thank you so much scott your extensive knowledge is a breath of fresh air i appreciate your site very much cheers from melbourne australia

About 11 min you said about the mylar disintegrating over time … isn’t that what they used for the solar shield for JWST?

Absolutely fascinating Scott. Something us mere mortals don't think of. Thank you.

Thanks Scott! Your historical presentations are wonderfully educational.

Scott I love your historic videos so much!! I have never heard of this mission before!

Fascinating! Thanks, Scott! 😊 Stay safe there with your family! 🖖😊

<a href="#" class="seekto" data-time="405">6:45</a> The best part about the 8-bit CGI is that I can imagine syncing up the audio for Dire Straits "Money for Nothing" with this.

My dad worked in the VDAS lab at JSC and spent a significant amount of time doing analytics of LDEF once they recaptured it, I still have some of the original film negatives... this all brings back memories, good stuff Scott!!

Brilliant video! Keep up the excellent work Scott!

"A bus-sized vehicle with a bunch of experiments slapped over its surface." So basically, everything I build in Kerbal.

That was great and really interesting. Nice work!

That was a really cool video Scott, thank you for doing it!!

Great video Scott! Great subject for a video. I don't remember hearing anything about this project. Thank you very much.

Thank you!! I knew about this but I never learned what they had discovered with the experiment.

This was a favorite project, even before the Shuttle took it up into space. I thought it was a great idea to have a school bus sized, free floating satellite to test out how materials would hold up in space over years. I suspect they should send something the equivalent to Cislunar space, a Long Duration Exposure Facility for the Moon, to test how materials hold up outside the Van Allen Belts.

One of your best episodes, though I love them all. Thank you

Very educational. Good work Scott, thanks for teaching us all.

Does this mean the millennium falcon's worn exterior is closer to reality than the enterprise's shiny paint job?

Very cool. What a great and worthwhile experiment!

Thanx for this thorough explanation Scott : that's a VERY interesting subject !!

The average space modeller: "Weathering only happens on re-entry." Me, after watching this video and sharing it with said modeller: "You fool!" That was a fascinating story I knew nothing about. Outgassing of supposedly "stable" components is one of the nasty surprises scale modelling has in store for you, sometimes. Thanks for sharing, Scott.

Scott " A lot of science was done, I have barely scratched the surface ". Good one.

I was peripherally involved in the LDEF retrieval. An exciting evening.

<a href="#" class="seekto" data-time="650">10:50</a> - they should have included Marathon chocolate bar wrappers in their arsenal of test materials! Many have been found on earth after decades of exposure to the atmosphere over Great Britain.

Thank you! That was very interesting.

I'm disappointed to hear it wasn't V-GER.

The shuttles were the best trucks ever. the epitome of "yeah.... im free this weekend." IYKYK.

Nothing starts the day better than a hot coffee, some buttered toast, and Scott Manley

These videos are the your finest work.

Please do another episode with more detail!!

This is another fascinating and interesting video. Thank you, Scott Manley.

That was really fascinating and extremely interesting to watch! Thank you!

Interesting note, PTFE a.k.a. "Teflon" included in the materials on LDEF, was surprisingly resistant to the deleterious effects of long term LEO.

<a href="#" class="seekto" data-time="585">9:45</a> Rudolph in shades. Keeping with the Christmas theme.

Excellent piece of knowledge!

Scott I love these videos. This one told me about something I didn't even know about. It was very interesting. Thanks for doing these videos. 😉

There were containers of seeds on that beast. My middle school was given some of the tomato seeds to grow.

I'd really like to hear more detail about the passive magnetic damper system. Gravity gradient I understand well but that mag system and how it kept the yaw angle steady is new to me.

Scott, what an excellent presentation..!!

Thanks Scott, that's top-of-the shelf training material for .. materials engineers coming to work in space projects

I was able to obtain one of the packets of seeds that were aboard LDEF. You were supposed to plant them and see if they grew. I never did…still could I guess 🤔

Our grade school got seeds from this to plant. I seem to remember them growing ok.

Very cool story. Thanks for digging this up and sharing.

The polymerisation of the organic molecules was interesting for the "life began with molecules from space" arguments.

Any ideas where is it now? Did they keep it or dismantled it completely? Definitely a unique piece of space history.

Singlet oxygen is wildly reactive, it’s cool to see what it does in a situation where it exists for more than a second or two.

An unusual focus on material science here, Scott! An interesting and well - researched piece … thanks!

Wow I'd heard a little bit about this but never got into the details this is fascinating!!!!! Love it Scott thanks for poking my brain in all the right spots again feels great lol.

You know, Scott, the title of this video is a very nice premise on which to build a Sci-Fi horror movie - and I'm sure it's actually been done already.

Skylab was Awesome!

I love this video so much! Thank you Scotty for the material science for our brains!

Amazing. Love learning something I never knew about.

I wonder what that little red Tesla looks like now.

A company I used to work for had 4 crates of LDEF material in their warehouse storage. I used to walk by them every day. I knew what the LDEF stencil and NASA worm logo l meant on the outside of each crate and I had a photo of the LDEF in orbit as my computer wallpaper for a long time.

Thank you sir very interesting piece one of the best I saw this year

Absolute hats off to the recovery team!! Unbelievable planning!! 🚀

The LDEF deployment was in the IMAX movie, The Dream is Alive.

Hey Scott, with all the hub-bub about regaining communication with Voyager 1, I was wondering, exactly what are the Voyager spacecraft still sending back (when they're not sending gibberish)

Thanks for this detailed breakdown of an important mission.

It's lovely hearing about these big discoveries like this, and all the research they inspired

I still have a 3 volume set of data from the 3rd post-retrieval symposium I picked up at a NASA open house.

<a href="#" class="seekto" data-time="836">13:56</a> “I’ve barely scratched the surface...” regrading tests of surface damage. Ha! I see what you did there. 😅

As a sailor, your proper use of Windward and Leeward was great to see. Glad I’m not the only sailing and space nerd out there!

Scott I love this, space history is so interesting and enlightening.

If you want a good practical example of debris messing with star-tracking systems, the Apollo 13 incident is a dramatic example. One of the first major steps they took after the explosion that damaged their craft was a burn to change their velocity enough that they were no longer traveling in the middle of a debris cloud and thus could figure out exactly where they were. Also, "Space Station Freedom is possibly the most 1980s American thing I've heard of that isn't SDI.

Molecular oxygen in the atmosphere is also great if you want to do things like breath.

Scott, well done. Things I never knew. Thanks

Very informative. Well done.

Outstanding video. Didn't know anything about this.

Another demonstration of the unique capabilities of the Space Shuttle. Many of the unique capabilities are not longer needed because we don't need humans for most of the space assembly activities, but it had those. It also can bring material to Earth and was designed for what, back then, was considered low gs. It was to ahead of its time. The lost of Challenger was not really a failure of the system but the bureaucracy, but still there were other close calls. I wonder what would have happened if Venture Star had been created. Maybe we will be enjoying a fantastic machine but paying ridiculous amounts of money (Space X may had failed against such an advanced machine). I hope wem eventually, recover this capability.

Hi Scott! Fly safe!

Thank you for this video! This LDEF was an inspirational news story of my youth that helped me become the scientist I am today! This is a fun flashback into that era of our history. Thanks for all you do!

LDEF was a great test.