The space shuttle is a rocket which brings astronauts and equipment to and from space and the International Space Station. The space shuttle was invented to replace the launch vehicle because it cost to much money to be used once. The shuttle's crew tests new technology and does experiments on how gravity effects people and things they need to know. They also repair and add parts to the space station. The three main parts of the space shuttle are the external tank, the two solid rocket boosters, and the orbited.
 
 

External Tank

Solid Rocket Boosters

Orbiter

The three main parts of the space shuttle are the external tank, the two solid rocket boosters, and the orbiter.
The three main engines and the solid rocket boosters lift the orbiter off the ground. When the solid rocket boosters fall off the main engines provide the thrust. The main engine weighs as much as a train engine and a stacked booster is 151 feet (46 meters). It weighs 3 times as much as the statue of liberty. The shuttle's Remote Manipulator System was provided by the Canadian Space Agency and weighs about 905 pounds. Atlantis, Enterprise, Pathfinder, Challenger, Discovery, Columbia, Endeavor, and Explorer are the names of all the space shuttles.

Another mission was on January 28, 1986. The space shuttle was called the Challenger. The commander was Francis R. Scobee and the mission specialists were Judith A. Resnick, Ronald E. McNair, and Ellison S. Onizuka. The other crew members were Gregory B. Javis, a payload specialist and Sharon Mc. Auliffe, a teacher. Sharon was the first teacher or non astronaut to go on a space shuttle. Unfortunately wan the Challenger left Kennedy Space Center 73 seconds into the flight it exploded leaving all seven crew members dead. The cause was by a leak in one of the solid rocket boosters that set the main liquid tank on fire. Their objective was to send Tracking Data Relay Satellite. This mission was not only not accomplished but a tragedy.

The space shuttle launched in 1996 was called Atlantis. It launched on September 16 at 4:54 a.m. Originally it was supposed to be on July 31, but the mission managers decided to switch out Atlantis' twin solid rocket boosters. After that the launch was going to be on September 12, but it was delayed again to September 12 due to Hurricane Fran. And if that wasn't enough 13 minutes into the flight the auxiliary power unit no.2 went down. After observing the auxiliary the Mission Management said they could proceed with the mission.
The crew was commander William F. Readdy, Pilot Terrance W. Willcutt, mission specialists Thomas D. Akers, John E. Blaha, Jay Apt, and Carl E. Waltz. They traveled 3.9 miles in 10 days, 3 hours, 18 minutes, and 26 seconds. They landed at Kennedy Space Center in Florida on September 26, 1996 at 8:13 a.m.

On July 4, 2006 at 2:38 p.m. the space shuttle Discovery was launched. The crew was Stephanie Wilson, Steve Lindsy, Lisa Nowak, Pieres Sellers, Mike Fossun, and Mark Kelly. Their mission was to test new equipment and procedures. The landed at Kennedy Space Center on July 17, 2006 at 9:15 a.m.

The first teacher or citizen on a space shuttle was Sharon Christa McAuliffe. By 1984 space shuttles no longer interested Americans so NASA wanted to bring back the excitement. President Reagen decided that a teacher is a suitable person to go on a space shuttle. That would be interesting and exciting. They searched for a teacher who could describe their experiences on the ship. They finally found Christa McAuliffe. She was a social studies teacher at Concord High School in Concord, New Hampshire.

Sharon Christa McAuliffe was born on September 2, 1948 in Framingham, Massachusetts. She went to school at Framingham State College were she majored in history and got a degree in 1970.  Also in 1970 she and Steve McAuliffe were married  and moved to Washington D.C. She taught there until she had her first child, Scott. Shortly after she earned a master degree in school administration. In 1978 they moved to Concord, New Hampshire and she had another child named Cardine.  The first school she taught after they had moved was Bow Memorial School and then she taught Concord High School. McAuliffe applied to be the first teacher in space and was chosen out of 11,500 teachers. She trained at NASA's facility in Houston for 114 hours. 73 seconds into the flight the shuttle exploded killing all seven crew members. McAuliffe called the mission "The Ultimate Field Trip".

Mamori Mohri was born on January 29, 1948 in Yoichi, Japan. He is a Japanese astronaut and a veteran of two NASA space shuttle missions. In chemistry he earned degrees from Hokkaido University. He also got a doctorate from Flinders University of South Australia in 1976. He was a member of the nuclear engineering faculty of Hokkaido University from 1975 to 1985. The National Space Development Agency of Japan selected him to train as a payload specialist. The training was for a Japanese materials science payload. Mohri was the first Japanese astronaut to be on a U.S space shuttle.

Credits:

http://seds.lpl.arizona.edu/nineplanets/nineplanets/nineplanets.html
http://www.nasa.gov/mission_pages/shuttle/shuttlemissions/list_main.html
http://news.bbc.co.uk/onthisday/hi/dates/stories/january/28/newsid_2506000/2506161.stm
http://history.nasa.gov/Biographies/challenger.html
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mamoru_Mohri
Picture of space shuttle taking off
http://www.nasa.gov/mission_pages/shuttle/vehicle/index.html
Picture of main engines
http://www.nasa.gov/returntoflight/system/system_SSME.html
http://chandra.harvard.edu/launch/shuttle/fun_facts.html
http://www.google.com/search?hl=en&lr=&defl=en&q=define:Space+shuttle&sa=X&oi=glossary_definition&ct=title
http://www.natureshift.org/robotLab/glossary.html#n-s
http://www.starhop.com/cm_bio.htm
Pictures of Orbiter, solid rocket boosters, and external tank
http://www.nasa.gov/audience/forkids/activities/A_Shuttle_Dog.html
http://spaceflight.nasa.gov/shuttle/reference/basics/ssme/