Space Shuttle Endeavour solid rocket motor is hoisted into place at California Science Center
The motor is part of the unique 20-story vertical display of famed shuttle at Exposition Park
Work crews install the first of two recently arrived 116-foot-long Solid Rocket Motors (SRMs) are lifted by a large, 450-foot-tall crane from their temporary location outside the California Science Center at Exhibition Park into their final vertical positions. Tuesday, Los Angeles CA/USA. Nov 7, 2023.
(Photo by Gene Blevins/Contributing Photographer)
Julio Sanchez recalls being in high school when the Space Shuttle Endeavour rolled into Los Angeles in 2012. Eleven years later, Sanchez, now a father of two young children, milled about near the California Science Center in South L.A.’s Exposition Park on Tuesday, Nov. 7, hoping to catch a glimpse of a 116-foot solid rocket motor being hoisted upright and lifted into position, to stand as part of what will ultimately be a 20-story vertical display of the Endeavour.
“It’s history in the making, you know. This is something that we’ll be able to tell our kids when we’re older,” said Sanchez, who had just dropped off his 8-year-old daughter at the Alexander Science Center School, next to the California Science Center.
The 450 ft crane towers above as crews install the first of two recently arrived 116-foot-long Solid Rocket Motors (SRMs) are lifted by a large, 450-foot-tall crane from their temporary location outside the California Science Center at Exhibition Park into their final vertical positions. Tuesday, Los Angeles CA/USA. Nov 7, 2023.
(Photo by Gene Blevins/Contributing Photographer)
Work crews install the first of two recently arrived 116-foot-long Solid Rocket Motors (SRMs) are lifted by a large, 450-foot-tall crane from their temporary location outside the California Science Center at Exhibition Park into their final vertical positions. Tuesday, Los Angeles CA/USA. Nov 7, 2023.
(Photo by Gene Blevins/Contributing Photographer)
Work crews install the first of two recently arrived 116-foot-long Solid Rocket Motors (SRMs) are lifted by a large, 450-foot-tall crane from their temporary location outside the California Science Center at Exhibition Park into their final vertical positions. Tuesday, Los Angeles CA/USA. Nov 7, 2023.
(Photo by Gene Blevins/Contributing Photographer)
Work crews install the first of two recently arrived 116-foot-long Solid Rocket Motors (SRMs) are lifted by a large, 450-foot-tall crane from their temporary location outside the California Science Center at Exhibition Park into their final vertical positions. Tuesday, Los Angeles CA/USA. Nov 7, 2023.
(Photo by Gene Blevins/Contributing Photographer)
Work crews install the first of two recently arrived 116-foot-long Solid Rocket Motors (SRMs) are lifted by a large, 450-foot-tall crane from their temporary location outside the California Science Center at Exhibition Park into their final vertical positions. Tuesday, Los Angeles CA/USA. Nov 7, 2023.
(Photo by Gene Blevins/Contributing Photographer)
Work crews install the first of two recently arrived 116-foot-long Solid Rocket Motors (SRMs) are lifted by a large, 450-foot-tall crane from their temporary location outside the California Science Center at Exhibition Park into their final vertical positions. Tuesday, Los Angeles CA/USA. Nov 7, 2023.
(Photo by Gene Blevins/Contributing Photographer)
A crew member keeps a eye on top as the install of the first of two recently arrived 116-foot-long Solid Rocket Motors (SRMs) are lifted by a large, 450-foot-tall crane from their temporary location outside the California Science Center at Exhibition Park into their final vertical positions. Tuesday, Los Angeles CA/USA. Nov 7, 2023.
(Photo by Gene Blevins/Contributing Photographer)
Work crews lift the first of two recently arrived 116-foot-long Solid Rocket Motors (SRMs) are lifted by a large, 450-foot-tall crane from their temporary location outside the California Science Center at Exhibition Park into their final vertical positions. Tuesday, Los Angeles CA/USA. Nov 7, 2023.
(Photo by Gene Blevins/Contributing Photographer)
Work crews watch as the first of two recently arrived 116-foot-long Solid Rocket Motors (SRMs) are lifted by a large, 450-foot-tall crane from their temporary location outside the California Science Center at Exhibition Park into their final vertical positions. Tuesday, Los Angeles CA/USA. Nov 7, 2023.
(Photo by Gene Blevins/Contributing Photographer)
Work crews get ready to lift the first of two recently arrived 116-foot-long Solid Rocket Motors (SRMs) are lifted by a large, 450-foot-tall crane from their temporary location outside the California Science Center at Exhibition Park into their final vertical positions. Tuesday, Los Angeles CA/USA. Nov 7, 2023.
(Photo by Gene Blevins/Contributing Photographer)
Work crews get ready to lift the first of two recently arrived 116-foot-long Solid Rocket Motors (SRMs) are lifted by a large, 450-foot-tall crane from their temporary location outside the California Science Center at Exhibition Park into their final vertical positions. Tuesday, Los Angeles CA/USA. Nov 7, 2023.
(Photo by Gene Blevins/Contributing Photographer)
Large trucks transport a pair of solid rocket boosters from the Mojave Air & Space Port down the southbound 15 freeway to the westbound 210 freeway in Rancho Cucamonga on Tuesday, Oct. 10, 2023. (Photo by Will Lester, Inland Valley Daily Bulletin/SCNG)
He decided to linger to watch the 104,000-pound rocket motor, which spans 12 feet in diameter, be moved into position at what will be the future Samuel Oschin Air and Space Center, a 200,000-square-foot expansion of the science center that’s under construction.
It would be another couple hours before the rocket motor would be lifted by a 450-foot crane and, about an hour after that, for it to be “mated,” or attached, to a base known as an aft skirt.
It’s not clear if Sanchez stayed the entire time, but his fascination with space rockets is not unique.
Former NASA astronaut Garrett Reisman, who before retiring flew in three space shuttles – the Endeavour, Discovery and Atlantis – and now teaches astronautical engineering at USC, dropped by for part of Tuesday morning to watch the activities.
He was 13 when he visited the space museum in Washington, D.C., a trip that fueled his love of space exploration and the sciences. As he spoke, a couple hundred feet away parents were dropping their children off at school or milling about as they got wind of the fact that a rocket motor would be lifted vertically.
Gesturing to the children, Reisman said that the California Science Center is hoping to instill a love and curiosity for the sciences, inspired by the highly anticipated Space Shuttle Endeavour display – which is not expected to be unveiled until the new Oschin center opens in a few years.
Among the millions of children who will visit the exhibit, he said, there could be “a kid that sees it and decides that they want to grow up and become an astronaut.”
Perhaps that kid might be 5-year-old Robeny Giron.
Robeny was supposed to be in his kindergarten classroom, like most weekdays, but on this day he stayed outside with his parents, Ariana and Walter Giron, and two younger brothers, as the family waited to see if the rocket motor would soon be moved.
Robeny, his parents said, has been learning about the solar system and reeling off facts about space that even his parents didn’t know.
That sense of awe from students is music to Jeffrey Rudolph’s ears. The president and CEO of California Science Center said it’s been a more than three-decade dream to get a vertical space shuttle display to L.A.
Besides figuring out the logistics that go into carrying out such a gargantuan feat, science center staff have had to raise hundreds of millions of dollars to finance the building that will house the Endeavour.
In addition to moving one rocket motor into position on Tuesday, a second motor is scheduled to be lifted and positioned into place next to the first one on Wednesday.
Once the entire display is ready to be unveiled, the Space Shuttle Endeavour – which has only been viewed horizontally at the science center since its arrival 11 years ago – will be the only shuttle in the world to be displayed vertically.
Rudolph described witnessing people get emotional as they realize how massive shuttles are in person. Like Reisman, Rudolph is hoping that emotional connection to space will inspire a new generation of scientists and astronauts.
“If we can get people emotionally engaged, then you can inspire them,” he said. “That’s really our mission.”
