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Aerospace · Recorded milestone

Reusable space shuttle

Recorded year1981

NASA's Space Shuttle flies 135 missions as a partially reusable orbiter.

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Built on

Carbon-fibre compositesRecorded · 1963enables
Moon landingRecorded · 1969enables
Digital fly-by-wireRecorded · 1972enables

Led to

Canadarm space armRecorded · 1981enables
Hubble Space TelescopeRecorded · 1990enables
International Space StationRecorded · 1998enables
Radar 3D map of EarthRecorded · 2000enables
Reusable orbital boosterRecorded · 2015enables
Crewed flight around the MoonRecorded · 2026enables

Sources & evidence

Additional source

Dataset updated 2026-10-18. This individual record has not been separately re-reviewed.