u/Futurographer

Of all the vehicles built by NASA, few compare to that of Sojourner. It was originally planned for its first mission to Mars in 1996, but after the Soviet Union announced their Mars-94 mission, its launch was moved up by two years.

Sojourner was the first spacecraft fully constructed on the moon. Many of the manufacturing breakthroughs that were made in its construction led directly to the Lunar Industrialization Boom of the 1990s and early 2000s, with a majority human-rated stations and ships being built on the moon by 2008. Sojourner-1, aka MV-101, was one of a planned five Sojourner-class Interplanetary Shuttles. Though after the unfortunate nature of the first Sojourner 1 mission, two of these planned Shuttles were scrapped, with their hulls being eventually used for transport between Jamestown and lunar space stations until 2011. MV-102 and MV-103 both went into service in 1996 and 1998 respectively. MV-102 would last the longest, being converted to a cargo vehicle in 2004 and is still in limited service between the Earth and Mars for radiation-sensitive materials. MV-103 would set the crewed vehicle speed record on its trip to mars, though it would only complete four trips before being retired for larger fusion-powered vehicles, with it now residing in the Ellen Wilson Space Museum in Texas.

The architecture of the Sojourners were based heavily off of the Pathfinder-class Shuttles, using the same type of thermal blankets and heat shield tiles which had first been designed for aerobraking through Earth's atmosphere from lunar orbital velocity. This design language carried over to its refuelling, where a gen-1 Space Shuttle External Tank would be used to fulfill this demand. This was out of necessity, as the new tanks were not ready for the 1994 launch, and so one of these tanks was taken out of storage for launch on a sea dragon. Given time constraints, no long-term ETs were available to be used. Because of this, the orange foam insulation that was used on them began to flake off in space. by the time they were fully fuelled and docked to the outgoing Sojourner-1, vast portions of the insulation had fell away. The launch of Sojourner-1 marked the last time an ET was ever used.

Hi Bob! Thank you for reading part 3 of Project Grey. As promised, Part 3 was decided by the you guys across r/ForAllMankindTV and r/AlternateHistory, where a Sojourner deep dive was suggested. Hope you liked it! Sorry for the wait, but Part 2 was very big, and I needed a bit of a break after it, which is also why this part is a bit smaller. Part 4 will explore the Soviet rockets that came from the N1. Part 5 will be community decided again, and I think Part 6 will be the last one. Thank you so much for the support for the project and I'm excited to see what's next!

Of all the vehicles built by NASA, few compare to that of Sojourner. It was originally planned for its first mission to Mars in 1996, but after the Soviet Union announced their Mars-94 mission, its launch was moved up by two years.

Sojourner was the first spacecraft fully constructed on the moon. Many of the manufacturing breakthroughs that were made in its construction led directly to the Lunar Industrialization Boom of the 1990s and early 2000s, with a majority human-rated stations and ships being built on the moon by 2008. Sojourner-1, aka MV-101, was one of a planned five Sojourner-class Interplanetary Shuttles. Though after the unfortunate nature of the first Sojourner 1 mission, two of these planned Shuttles were scrapped, with their hulls being eventually used for transport between Jamestown and lunar space stations until 2011. MV-102 and MV-103 both went into service in 1996 and 1998 respectively. MV-102 would last the longest, being converted to a cargo vehicle in 2004 and is still in limited service between the Earth and Mars for radiation-sensitive materials. MV-103 would set the crewed vehicle speed record on its trip to mars, though it would only complete four trips before being retired for larger fusion-powered vehicles, with it now residing in the Ellen Wilson Space Museum in Texas.

The architecture of the Sojourners were based heavily off of the Pathfinder-class Shuttles, using the same type of thermal blankets and heat shield tiles which had first been designed for aerobraking through Earth's atmosphere from lunar orbital velocity. This design language carried over to its refuelling, where a gen-1 Space Shuttle External Tank would be used to fulfill this demand. This was out of necessity, as the new tanks were not ready for the 1994 launch, and so one of these tanks was taken out of storage for launch on a sea dragon. Given time constraints, no long-term ETs were available to be used. Because of this, the orange foam insulation that was used on them began to flake off in space. by the time they were fully fuelled and docked to the outgoing Sojourner-1, vast portions of the insulation had fell away. The launch of Sojourner-1 marked the last time an ET was ever used. The story of Sojourner-1 did not, however, stop at Mars. It would embark on yet another incredible journey in 2012. but that is a story for another day.

Hi Bob! Thank you for reading part 3 of Project Grey. As promised, Part 3 was decided by the you guys across r/ForAllMankindTV and r/AlternateHistory, where a Sojourner deep dive was suggested. Hope you liked it! Sorry for the wait, but Part 2 was very big, and I needed a bit of a break after it, which is also why this part is a bit smaller. Part 4 will explore the Soviet rockets that came from the N1. Part 5 will be community decided again, and I think Part 6 will be the last one. Thank you so much for the support for the project and I'm excited to see what's next!

In September of 1983, Space Shuttle Pathfinder, OV-201, flew off of the back of a C-5 Galaxy to the moon, marking the first time a fully reusable spacecraft ever launched. It is often forgotten, however, the semi-reusable Shuttles that came before it. Between august of 1981 and January of 1983, a total of ten generation-1 Shuttles would be built. in order of first launch, these were Columbia, Challenger, Discovery, Enterprise, Atlantis, Constitution, Endeavour, Victoria, Kan-Tiki, and Beagle. While these Shuttles were ambitious for their time, it took almost a decade for them to finish construction, with the approval of the Shuttle finalizing in 1970, but not seeing its first launch until 1981. These delays were primarily due to the rapid expansion of NASA back to the funding levels of the mid-60s. This required NASA to not only reactivate the production line of the Saturn V but also begin work on the Sea Dragon rocket at the same time as the Shuttle Program. Before Columbia ever flew, plans for a second-generation orbiter were being finalized, and the Generation-2 nuclear Shuttle began construction in 1979.

A total of twelve Pathfinder Shuttles were constructed between 1983 and 1989. These were Space Shuttle Pathfinder, Vanguard, Inspiration, Observation, Intrepid, Kitty Hawk, Paradise, Independence, America, Resilience, Exploration, and Titan. Like Enterprise and Constitution before them, some of these Shuttles would be moved from NASA to the Air Force, and later the Space Force in 1989. While the first-generation Shuttles had a turn around time of approximately three months, the Pathfinder Shuttles were capable of a flight every month. this meant that, with a crew capacity of twelve (without the later Spacehab payload module) the launch cadence of the USA grew to over 1700 Astronauts per year. The program did have a rocky start, as in 1989, Space Shuttle Independence depressurized while coming back to Earth, killing the crew on board. This resulted in the grounding of the Pathfinder fleet and the pushback of the Gen-1 fleet retirement by nearly a year. the Pathfinder fleet continued to operate until its slow phase-out in the late 90s and early 2000s. The final flight of a Pathfinder Shuttles, taken on by the original Pathfinder itself, took place in 2010, after almost a year since its last flight.

While Pathfinder first started flying, the USSR's Cosmo-Shuttle began as well. The USSR had prioritized the reusability of main stages over vehicles, creating the Block-RA in 1975 for their new N2 and N3 rockets. This same reusable stage would be used for the NCS rocket. This rocket was made up of the Block-RA first stage, Block-B second stage, and the side-mounted Cosmo-Shuttle, along with two side-mounted solid rocket boosters. This rocket stack, especially the boosters and shuttle design, were based heavily on the American Shuttle. While it was far more reusable than the American gen-1 Shuttle, by 1988, the USSR had created their own second-generation shuttle. This vehicle differed significantly from the American Pathfinder. The Mriya Shuttle was the world's first true SSTO. It was far more crew-centric, giving up most of its cargo capacity to the N3 and later N4 rockets, and it was capable of delivering up to 50 people to space at a time.

In 1991, the US was determined to bring their own SSTO up to speed. This was made possible by the generation-3 Space Shuttle. The first gen-3 Shuttle lifted off in April of 1997. These new Shuttles are capable of bringing up to 110 tonnes to low Earth orbit and have crew variants that can bring up to 80 people at a time. This vehicle is the largest reusable Earth-to-Moon vehicle ever constructed. It is capable of taking off and landing from standard commercial runways and can remain in orbit for up to six months on its own. The production of this vehicle type continues to be built to the modern day. 24 of these vehicles are in operation, 15 used by NASA, 8 used by the Space Force, and one loaned out to Helios Aerospace as a technological test bed. These vehicles are still considered the gold standard of aerospace engineering, even while they are no longer alone in terms of technological advancement, with the private sector expanding its influence in space. The Space Shuttle remains as a formidable tether for those living and working in Space to the Earth.

Hi Bob! Thank you for reading part 2 of Project Grey. In this part we looked at the history of the Shuttle program in For All Mankind, and how it changed over the course of forty years from a humble launch vehicle to the backbone of government space infrastructure. As promised, Part 3 will be decided by the top comment of this post across r/ForAllMankindTV and r/AlternateHistory. But I will be taking suggestions and influence from all comments! I'm excited to see what people decide and I will be back with part 3 soon!

In September of 1983, Space Shuttle Pathfinder, OV-201, flew off of the back of a C-5 Galaxy to the moon, marking the first time a fully reusable spacecraft ever launched. It is often forgotten, however, the semi-reusable Shuttles that came before it. Between august of 1981 and January of 1983, a total of ten generation-1 Shuttles would be built. in order of first launch, these were Columbia, Challenger, Discovery, Enterprise, Atlantis, Constitution, Endeavour, Victoria, Kan-Tiki, and Beagle. While these Shuttles were ambitious for their time, it took almost a decade for them to finish construction, with the approval of the Shuttle finalizing in 1970, but not seeing its first launch until 1981. These delays were primarily due to the rapid expansion of NASA back to the funding levels of the mid-60s. This required NASA to not only reactivate the production line of the Saturn V but also begin work on the Sea Dragon rocket at the same time as the Shuttle Program. Before Columbia ever flew, plans for a second-generation orbiter were being finalized, and the Generation-2 nuclear Shuttle began construction in 1979.

A total of twelve Pathfinder Shuttles were constructed between 1983 and 1989. These were Space Shuttle Pathfinder, Vanguard, Inspiration, Observation, Intrepid, Kitty Hawk, Paradise, Independence, America, Resilience, Exploration, and Titan. Like Enterprise and Constitution before them, some of these Shuttles would be moved from NASA to the Air Force, and later the Space Force in 1989. While the first-generation Shuttles had a turn around time of approximately three months, the Pathfinder Shuttles were capable of a flight every month. this meant that, with a crew capacity of twelve (without the later Spacehab payload module) the launch cadence of the USA grew to over 1700 Astronauts per year. The program did have a rocky start, as in 1989, Space Shuttle Independence depressurized while coming back to Earth, killing the crew on board. This resulted in the grounding of the Pathfinder fleet and the pushback of the Gen-1 fleet retirement by nearly a year. the Pathfinder fleet continued to operate until its slow phase-out in the late 90s and early 2000s. The final flight of a Pathfinder Shuttles, taken on by the original Pathfinder itself, took place in 2010, after almost a year since its last flight.

While Pathfinder first started flying, the USSR's Cosmo-Shuttle began as well. The USSR had prioritized the reusability of main stages over vehicles, creating the Block-RA in 1975 for their new N2 and N3 rockets. This same reusable stage would be used for the NCS rocket. This rocket was made up of the Block-RA first stage, Block-B second stage, and the side-mounted Cosmo-Shuttle, along with two side-mounted solid rocket boosters. This rocket stack, especially the boosters and shuttle design, were based heavily on the American Shuttle. While it was far more reusable than the American gen-1 Shuttle, by 1988, the USSR had created their own second-generation shuttle. This vehicle differed significantly from the American Pathfinder. The Mriya Shuttle was the world's first true SSTO. It was far more crew-centric, giving up most of its cargo capacity to the N3 and later N4 rockets, and it was capable of delivering up to 50 people to space at a time.

In 1991, the US was determined to bring their own SSTO up to speed. This was made possible by the generation-3 Space Shuttle. The first gen-3 Shuttle lifted off in April of 1997. These new Shuttles are capable of bringing up to 110 tonnes to low Earth orbit and have crew variants that can bring up to 80 people at a time. This vehicle is the largest reusable Earth-to-Moon vehicle ever constructed. It is capable of taking off and landing from standard commercial runways and can remain in orbit for up to six months on its own. The production of this vehicle type continues to be built to the modern day. 24 of these vehicles are in operation, 15 used by NASA, 8 used by the Space Force, and one loaned out to Helios Aerospace as a technological test bed. These vehicles are still considered the gold standard of aerospace engineering, even while they are no longer alone in terms of technological advancement, with the private sector expanding its influence in space. The Space Shuttle remains as a formidable tether for those living and working in Space to the Earth.

Hi Bob! Thank you for reading part 2 of Project Grey. In this part we looked at the history of the Shuttle program in FAM, and how it changed over the course of forty years from a humble launch vehicle to the backbone of government space infrastructure. As promised, Part 3 will be decided by the top comment of this post across r/ForAllMankindTV and r/AlternateHistory. But I will be taking suggestions and influence from all comments! I'm excited to see what people decide and I will be back with part 3 soon!