Space Shuttle America
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
| Space Shuttle America | |
|---|---|
 Space Shuttle America viewed from Sky Trek Tower |
|
| OV Designation | None |
| Country | United States |
| First flight | Not an Orbiter; themed motion simulator ride. |
Space Shuttle America (also known as Space Shuttle America - The Next Century) is a motion simulator ride at the Six Flags Great America theme park in Gurnee, Illinois, that opened in 1994. The ride's main feature is a full-scale replica of an American Space Shuttle.
Contents |
[edit] Storyline
Guests enter a building that has a small replica of Launch Control at Cape Canaveral While waiting in line several TV screens display fake NASA TV recordings about the shuttle and security cam views of the fictional facility that attendees are supposedly touring. Shortly before boarding there is a notice about a meteor that is coming near Earth.
The storyline of the ride is that you have boarded a new Space Shuttle called America, which is capable of transporting passengers to the fictional Armstrong City using the LRVM (Lunar Run Velocity Management) Warp. Armstrong City is located a short distance from the site of the first Manned Moon Landing.
In the movie, the shuttle takes off horizontally and the Pas-Com (Passenger Compartment) rises out of the cargo bay so you can do some orbital sightseeing. The shuttle passes Space Shuttle Destiny, which is doing some cleanup work around the atmosphere. Next the shuttle passes an HBO satellite and the fictional Space Station Freedom 3. The shuttle then makes its way away from Earth and enters LRVM warp and exits a short distance from the moon. The shuttle then flies over the Sea of Tranquility and flies over Armstrong City. Shortly before landing in the city an alert is sent to the shuttle crew ordering them to investigate a meteor danger in the area. The shuttle, not even getting a chance to land, takes off again towards an asteroid belt. America is then hit by an asteroid and is now fighting to survive in the asteroid field. America begins blasting asteroids with its 'Particle Beam' (laser). The shuttle then spots the meteor and is alerted it is heading on a direct course to Earth. Unable to destroy it from a distance, the shuttle flies through a canyon and a cave and destroyes it from the inside. The shuttle, now crippled, heads immediately back towards the LRVM and warps back to Earth. The hydraulics for the Pas-Com then malfunction just as the shuttle begins Earth re-entry but they come down just before re-entry. The shuttle lands and the ride ends.
The events take place in 2094.
The movie was shown for a short while at Six Flags Over Texas, and was made by DreamQuest Images.
[edit] Shuttle
Outside the building that houses the queue and the ride itself is a fiberglass mock-up of a real Space Shuttle that uses real "tiles" that a real space shuttle uses. The shuttle was built to exact scale as a real space shuttle, but is not capable of spaceflight. It is not an official NASA shuttle.
[edit] Other movies
The building that shows Space Shuttle America also showed:
- Escape from Dino Island in 3D (1999-2001)
- Stargate SG-3000 (2004-2005)
- Superstition (Playing during Fright Fest since 2005)
[edit] Future
The ride is rumored to have damaged its hydraulics for the simulator. The damage was blamed on the Superstition film that was shown during Fright Fest.[citation needed]
It is also rumored that the park wants to remove Space Shuttle America to expand the nearby Hurricane Harbor waterpark.
[edit] See also
[edit] External link
- Space Shuttle America - Webpage made by someone who helped make the ride.
|
|
||
|---|---|---|
| Main articles | Space Shuttle · Space Shuttle program |  |
| Components | Orbiter · SRB · External Tank · SSME · OMS | |
| Orbiters | Enterprise · Columbia · Challenger · Discovery · Atlantis · Endeavour | |
| Launch sites | Kennedy Space Center LC-39 · Vandenberg Air Force Base SLC-6 | |
| Developments | Shuttle-Derived Launch Vehicle · Shuttle-C · Ares I · Ares V | |
| Testing | Pathfinder · MPTA · MPTA-ET | |
| Other articles | Missions (cancelled) · Decision to build · Crews · Abort modes · Space shuttles in fiction · Crawler-transporter · Space Shuttle America (motion simulator ride) · Shuttle Mockup Explorer | |
