In a procession that will take as much as a day, Endeavour will be moved east on State Drive, past the Exposition Park Rose Garden, and be parked next to its new museum home, just west of the California African American Museum. Workers will use self-propelled modular transporters, similar to those used in 2012 when Endeavour was moved from Los Angeles International Airport to the museum. It’ll be parked there for a couple of days as crews prepare equipment to move it to the eastern edge of the science center. It’ll first be rolled onto the lawn just north of the Los Angeles Memorial Coliseum and south of the Natural History Museum of Los Angeles County. The same month, Endeavour will be moved from its temporary hangar, on the western edge of the California Science Center. The most dramatic part of installation will come as early as January when the 66,000-pound, 154-foot long external tank - the last of its kind in existence - will be rolled out and hoisted by cranes into a vertical position. Diagrids have been used in other tall buildings, including the 46-story Hearst Tower in New York City, the iconic 40-story ovular Gherkin skyscraper in London and a section of the egg-shaped London City Hall. The building will feature a “diagrid” - a diagonal grid - developed by engineering firm Arup and covered by a stainless steel facade. And to keep the views unobstructed, the building has been engineered with no vertical supports except its walls. The full-stack configuration of Endeavour is so tall that the museum will rise 20 stories to make room for it. And we’ll be the only place in the world with a stack of all real hardware,” Jenkins said. Of the three shuttles left, Endeavour will be the only one displayed upright In a dramatic finale that could come as early as January, cranes - the tallest of which will be about the height of City Hall - will raise the spacecraft from its horizontal position to point vertically for its final display, where the rest of the museum will then be built around it.Ĭalifornia Space shuttle Endeavour is getting its own grand museum in L.A., displayed in launch position It could be years before Endeavour will again be available for up-close viewing to museum guests. 31 before the shuttle is carefully moved to the new building site. It also marks the countdown for Endeavour to conclude its exhibition in a horizontal position, which will end Dec. Thursday’s announcement comes about a year after ground was broken on the Samuel Oschin Air and Space Center. Even a slight misalignment could cause major problems later on - making it impossible to connect the solid rocket boosters to the external tank, and the external tank to Endeavour. “You could arguably say the most critical piece to put in because they determine how everything else works,” said Dennis Jenkins, project director for the Samuel Oschin Air and Space Center. Eventually, all half-million pounds of the full stack - including the shuttle Endeavour and a giant orange external tank - will rest on the base of the solid rocket boosters, bolted to the ground by eight supersized, superalloy fasteners that are 9 feet long and weigh 500 to 600 pounds. It’ll be the first of many delicate maneuvers conducted over roughly six months (if the weather cooperates). Workers will use a 300-ton crane to lower the bottom sections of the twin solid rocket boosters, which are 10,000 pounds apiece and roughly 9 feet tall, to the freshly built lowest section of the partly constructed $400-million Samuel Oschin Air and Space Center. To get ready for the grand move, the state-run museum announced Thursday that crews will begin the installation of the base of the shuttle’s full stack on July 20. After more than a decade on display at the California Science Center, the space shuttle Endeavour will begin the final trek to its permanent home at a new Los Angeles building in the coming months.
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