On June 18, 1983, the space shuttle Challenger launched on the STS-7 mission crewed by the first flight American female astronaut, Mission Specialist Sally K. Ride.
On June 18, 1983, the space shuttle Challenger launched from Kennedy Space Center on the STS-7 mission crewed by the first flight American female astronaut, Mission Specialist Sally K. Ride. The mission also carried with it the first Shuttle Payload Satellite, SPAS-1, which contained ten experiments and could be held in the shuttle’s payload bay or deployed and recaptured by the Canadian-built robotic arm or Remote Manipulator System (RMS). The mission served as a spaceborne laboratory for the Office of Space and Terrestrial Applications (OSTA-2) payload. Although originally scheduled to land at Kennedy, inclement weather forced STS-7 to land at Edwards Air Force Base on June 24, 1983.
Image credit: NASA