What Was The Fastest Space Shuttle? The Answer Surprised Me! 

I nominate Kilo Feet Per Second KFPS for the most indecisive unit. SI, Metric, Imperial? Yes...

Faster, Faster, until the thrill of speed overcomes the fear of death.

This video has sort of CGP Grey vibe to it - digging so much and correcting yourself so many times, dealing with a lack of documentation, love it

An episode filled with spreadsheets and charts....Adrian Beil from NSF would absolutely LOVE this !!! Edit: Fixed a critical spelling error....!

"unfortunately Challenger couldn't be with us to accept the award tonight" Too soon, Scott, too soon...

"Challenger couldn't be with us to accept the award" Oof

I've seen lots of Space Shuttle Videos, but the video of the Cloud Silhouette Shock Cones was pretty damn awesome!

"So I created a spreadsheet..." Total geek-out central! 😎

Dang Scott. That's a LOT of work and math to prove someone wrong not for the sake of 'beating' them but rather to prevent the spread of misinformation. I salute you, sir.

Scott gives us a free video to justify his "Well actually...." Awesome

Worked on the STS and Ares Programs for 22 years at KSC and I seem to remember the Long Duration Exposure Facility when it was retrieved as being a “Bear” to wrestle down safely with more then the usual number of tires blowing up on the Landing Strip. How was the greater mass affecting speeds and control?

“…Unfortunately Challenger couldn’t be with us to accept the award tonight…”? Ouch. Too soon.

For anyone wondering as I was: The chutes that are deployed behind the Shuttle when it lands on the tarmac, those are not parachutes. That is a drogue parachute, also called a drag chute, drag parachute, drogue chute, or braking parachute.

Tons of research there Scott, well done lad, well done.

My favorite will always be Endeavor. The youngest and the one built from all the spare parts left over from the OG program.

The record for fastest winged mammal goes to Space-Bat (STS-119) of course.

Hello Scott, first of all thanks for the videos you are doing and your efort to translate speeds from imperial to international. But could you also edit them on the screen to be read? Also you are missing some convertions at the end. Cheers :D

Not sure of the original debate but if it’s “powered flight” it’s still the X-15 and if it’s “jet powered flight” it’s still the SR-71.

This is the best "SOMEBODY IS WRONG ON THE INTERNET!" Video i have seen in a long time.

1:13 so that is why we see in some camera views an invisible line going through the frame.

well, the question is, what is a plane? because if the shuttle in ascend goes, than every other rocket has to be valid, and if the shuttle in descent valid, than every other stuff that has no way to produce thrust has to go, ok, you can say, it must generate lift, but many return pod designed to do it, and all do it (barely, but still) and must be able to maneuver, but also some pod can do that (few did, other than missile reentry stuff.) so are we sure with these extension it is still the shuttle, and not some of the pods (with or without human on board) or the falling reentry vehicles, that never intended to stop, so they could go as fast as they can.

Ingenuity - a helicopter, not a drone. The rotary wing unmanned aircraft reached its largest earth stationary reference frame speed during its launch aboard Atlas 541 at T+52 min. 50 sec., at the moment of Centaur cutoff. I couldn’t find an exact speed, and it was only an aircraft in transport under a rover, that was in transport inside a transfer capsule, that was in transport on top of an upper stage.

Have to qualify the no parachutes as the Shuttles used chutes for braking once they were on the ground. So you need to say no parachutes for descent.

Wow Scott, that was a magnificent effort you put in for this! Congratulations to Discovery--my second favorite shuttle! (runs away laughing!)

I cannot understand how a literal rocket scientist could tolerate using so horrid a unit as "kilofeet per second."

So the faster aircraft ever is a glider .... This is why I love the Shuttle .... ....I also love the Buran ... that it's one flight, completely automated (something the Shuttle couldn't do) ... nearly beat the Shuttle's record is just icing on the cake ...

**no one, absolutely no one** Scott: so I plugged all this information into my spreadsheet

My cousin was pilot on STS-48. Discovery for the win! 🥳

It's not entirely accurate to say that 28.5 deg is "the lowest inclination you can get from Florida". If you have a _lot_ of excess delta-V you can execute an plane change burn at the orbital node. The only time I can recall that being done was for IXPE, and it basically reduced the 15t LEO payload capacity of F9 to 330 kg.

Yay! Discovery! I don't know why, but I'm happy with the result :D

Thank you for sharing getting your geek on.

Very cool that Scott has found that shuttle document. It's my favourite

I watched most of this video at 1.75 speed (I was trying it out for the first time) and Scott's theme at the end is actually really cool at 1.75 speed lol

Does a manhole cover have wings? Just asking

intensely good content mr manley

IIRC, the US wanted to use Vandenberg AFB as a STS launch site to enable a polar orbit. Using what we know about the shuttle’s performance. Would a launch from the west coast have had a higher EI velocity, or would the math have worked out such that the shuttle would have had to use a lower orbit to compensate for the lack of using the Earths rotation and thus the EI would have been lower?

You got me excited there for a second there

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

12:28 so if parachutes are not allowed for landing, how is the Space Shuttle the winner?

It will be interesting to see Starship's reentry velocity... although if its landing horizontally, there is a clear problem.

The definition of plane is powered flight. Therefore the space shuttle is a glider, not a plane, however by the same definition the sr-71 is not the fastest and it would instead be the x-15 as it was powered flight. Therefore everyone was wrong, and the fastest plane is the x-15 (Details matter).

3:04 I would love to learn from a video of yours about how Discovery managed to do such a re-entry burn from that high up an orbit!

**arguement on the Internet appears** Scott Manley: "Hold my spreadsheet and watch this!" 😂😂😁😁😇😇

Heart and tears goes to challenger❤

I saw your spreadsheet and I said "God love ya, man. Have you done any videos about 'inclination' and why is that important?

The criterion to "land without deploying parachutes" would invalidate the later missions of the shuttle program, weirdly enough. On the other hand, Soviet Venera landers of the later modifications did not use parachutes, they had a simple skirt of metal to create sufficient drag for soft landings in the dense Venusian atmosphere. And they were going at interplanetary velocities before entry, so they may be the actual record holders by such measure.

For the candidate for slowest shuttle, have you thought about Enterprise, the very first shuttle? That thing being a development model, it couldn't go very fast to begin with as they didn't want to risk it.

Apollo reentry interface velocities, please 🙏🏻!! I know the data probably wasn’t recorded in the same way. But I believe interface velocities were up in the 35K fps range, with smaller interface angle ranges? But, if you can…?

that meme format is incredible -nice use 👏

That's why Megan Macarthur ( and some others ) has a 26 on her patch while most astronauts have a 25. :)

That's not flying, that's falling with style!

challenger was my favorite in a respectful way.

12:26: What about drag chutes deployed as aerobrakes during a horizontal landing or just after touchdown? If those are disqualifying, Buran might be out, because at least during its one landing it did deploy those. I don't know if it technically would have needed to or if it could just have rolled out a little farther, but that's what it did when it landed. There's gloriously lo-fi footage of it. PS: Note though that a bunch of Soviet planes, jet fighters I think, also deploy drag chutes during landing. Are you arguing those aren't aircraft either? Edit: I've just seen footage of an F-16 landing with a drag chute. I'm not sure if they always do that, but there it is. So if drag-chute-landing aircraft are out, so are all kinds of American jets too, it would seem.

Since Joe Scotts all animals that went to space video is still on my mind, whats the fastest anything, that returned with its (likely not human) passengers alive?

The level of geekdom that this required, is absolutely incredible.

I enjoyed the video. :) But could you possibly cut down the number of significant digits displayed on your spreadsheet so we can read it faster, and at its real accuracy? Please! ;)

Thanks, Scott for that in-depth investigation.

That was a rabbit-hole worthy of CGP Grey.

Great down the rabbit hole math video, thanks Scott!

Dream Chaser should do a Sun-synchronous orbit (SSO) test flight and take the title of fastest spaceplane ever!

it's a small change, but your title "The Answer Suprised Me!" is so much better than "The Answer Will Suprise You!" Still enticing, but not clickbate.

What about return vehicle weight? Some missions brought stuff back. And a heavier vehicle has a higher speed. I think. eg, high performance gliders carry ballast in the wings to icbm crease their speed. And shuttle re-entry is a glider.

Does mass have a factor in the calculation will a higher mass re-enter faster?

This is such a geek dive !

There is a joke somewhere in here on the Challenger re-entry speed, but we don't go here.

at 8:42 spreadsheet comes out, yessssss

"I can't come to bed, someone is wrong on the internet!"

I am wondering STS-48 and STS-36 are happened before Space Shuttle Challenger disaster. So, basically to get a higher return speed, you need enough energy to launch it 1st. And it is the truth you can reduced the payload to increase the energy you can use to increase speed, but since all space shuttle are so expansive, I believe they are going to load it as much as possible. As the result, am I be able to safely say that safety updates after the Challenger disaster effects the Space shuttle ability?

How did the shuttle avoid burn through at the circular connection points of the orange fuel tank?

pretty sure the 737-800 we had on the way back from Vegas is a close second...

Next video ... how many angels can dance on the head of a pin.

Well, I'm glad that even though my initial guess was wrong, it was at least the same one Scott made 😂 And in the end, she wins after all. Another reason for Discovery to be my favourite orbiter (besides the cool name, longest time in space, two return-to-flight missions, and Hubble launch)

12:31 - "Land horizontally without deploying parachutes or anything like that." *[Really wants to point out that the Space Shuttle used a landing drag chute for every landing]*

But... what is the is the air-speed velocity on an unladen swallow?And which one is the fastest?

Was waiting for the Buran joke

My money is on the Colombia at the reentry. They even look like a fireball

No doubt the Discovery flight was the fastest, and I agree that "flying like an airplane at some point" should be part of the requirement for fastest airplane. But what may be harder to determine is the actual record speed, i.e. how fast was it going when it transitioned from being a spacecraft to an airplane. NASA used 400,000 feet as a standard for entry interface, but of course similar to the Karman line it's somewhat arbitrary. And in the early phases of entry interface the Shuttles were still operating more like a spacecraft, generating lift yes but not much different than Apollo etc. (which Scott alluded to). The RCS thrusters were still operational because there was little effective control. Yes it did have control surfaces (unlike Apollo) but they behaved somewhat bizarrely in the early stages of entry interface. The elevons for example created very little lift but did create drag, so they would move the elevons just to create some asymmetrical drag as a way to do some attitude control. Also the rudder was pretty much ineffective due to the high angle of attack until they dropped below hypersonic speeds, so RCS was used for yaw control until then. Somewhere in there the Shuttle became an airplane not a spacecraft, but I'm not sure when that would be or how you would define it. One measure might be the point where the Shuttle stopped using RCS thrusters, but then again we have fighter jets that steer with their engines, so that's not the ideal measure either.

The SR-71 was only the fasted “air breathing” jet ever made

You’re such a nerd - and I love it!

You forgot about The Enterprise’s test flights. Lol

Lego Technic a giant kit of the space shuttle orbiter more than two thousand pieces price $270.00

0:22 tfw enterprise shafted lol

What's the fastest unmanned missile with aerodynamic flight?

So... prior to Mark Watney... who was the fastest man in the history of space travel?

I love ya Scott but all space shuttles deployed parachutes.

Proud alumni of Discovery Middle School!

" protected from the heat of reentry by its thermal protection systems" Wellllllllllll

*I decided to break out the spherical trigonometry…* Excel has left the chat

Do we have enough info to plug in numbers for the x-37?

Well, if you're being this pedantic... Wouldn't one of the Apollo capsules or Orion be faster? Those technically fly as well with their center of gravity and lift being offset in a way that allows them to glide into a specified flight window. You know.. just like the shuttle.

By (7:20) I had gone cross-eyed…

@11:18 too soon!

What about STS-52? It had steeper re-entry angle.

Just for fun, is the ISS an aircraft when it goes into Night Glider mode?

I would assume then that it is also the fastest glider ever built.

8:01 meme game is stroooong

what about landing at EAFB? It's a wee slower than the (321)? (that's the area code for KSC).

Didn't the space shuttle also have parachutes?

loved the vid but at the end to get the fastest you said not deploying parachute. Didn't shuttle deploy a parachute on landing?

24,800 Feet per second = 16,909.09 Miles per hour What's that... Mach 30? ~ Remember Mach varies with atmospheric conditions.