After solid rocket booster separation, where will the boosters splashdown in the ocean?
The solid rocket boosters provide most of the thrust for our first stage of ascent performance. That’s a solid rocket fuel system, and they ignite at T-0 and liftoff of the space shuttle system. The solid rocket fuel burns for 2 minutes and 5 seconds, after which they begin to burn out and tail off, and separation of the boosters from the external tank occurs 2 minutes and 7 seconds into flight. At that time, the shuttle is going extremely fast. The main engines of the space shuttle are still burning, and will burn for another 6-1/2 minutes or so. But nevertheless, the solids have done their job providing the vast majority of the initial thrust for the system. So they separate from the external tank and fall back down to Earth in the Atlantic Ocean, approximately 140 miles northeast of the Kennedy Space Center. Out in the ocean, we have two recovery vessels that rendezvous with the boosters in the ocean, get them in tow and bring them back to the port and eventually to the Kennedy Spac
