Where does this come from, and can I check it?

Five winged orbiters carried crews and cargo between 1981 and 2011. The figure is taken from NASA Science, which is linked in full on this page. Every fact on Mondo Knows names its source rather than repeating an unsourced claim.

Is this really a space fact?

Yes. It sits on the Space shelf, one of 2,600 sourced facts grouped into space, animals, the human body, history, science and more. Category pages collect every fact in the same field.

What else can I read about it?

The links under the fact point to a quiz, game, puzzle or calculator on the same subject, and the shelf below shows related facts. The wording here is original, and quoted phrases are marked as quotations.

Mondo Knows Facts

The Space Shuttle flew 135 missions over 30 years

Five winged orbiters carried crews and cargo between 1981 and 2011 Columbia opened the programme in April 1981 and Atlantis closed it in July 2011 after 135 flights. The shuttle was the first reusable orbital spacecraft, with solid rocket boosters fished out of the ocean and a winged orbiter that landed on a runway. Two orbiters, Challenger and Columbia, were lost with their crews. It sits in Mondo's space collection, one of 200 facts that each trace back to the reference below.

Where this comes from

NASA Science

Facts that can change over time are reviewed and updated. If something here looks wrong, Mondo would rather know than be confidently incorrect.

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Space & Astronomy trivia

More facts like this

The space shuttle flew 135 missionsFive orbiters carried 355 people between 1981 and 2011 Sally Ride became the first American woman in space in 1983She flew on the shuttle Challenger with five crewmates Crew Dragon restored US crew launches in 2020Demo-2 carried two NASA astronauts to the station from Florida Falcon 9 landed its first booster in 2015The rocket touched down upright in Florida after an orbital launch Luna 3 photographed the Moon's hidden sideThe 1959 Soviet probe returned the first images of the far hemisphere Venera 7 survived a landing on VenusThe 1970 probe sent data from the surface for about 23 minutes

Tags: shuttle, reusable, orbiters

The Space Shuttle flew 135 missions over 30 years: the short answers

Where does this come from, and can I check it?: Five winged orbiters carried crews and cargo between 1981 and 2011. The figure is taken from NASA Science, which is linked in full on this page. Every fact on Mondo Knows names its source rather than repeating an unsourced claim.
Is this really a space fact?: Yes. It sits on the Space shelf, one of 2,600 sourced facts grouped into space, animals, the human body, history, science and more. Category pages collect every fact in the same field.
What else can I read about it?: The links under the fact point to a quiz, game, puzzle or calculator on the same subject, and the shelf below shows related facts. The wording here is original, and quoted phrases are marked as quotations.