Orbiter Processing Facility
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The Orbiter Processing Facility (OPF) is the hangar where NASA's Space Shuttle Orbiter undergoes maintenance between flights.
When a mission is completed, the orbiter is parked in its OPF. Its previous mission payloads are removed and the vehicle is fully inspected, tested, and refurbished, including re-tiling of the Thermal Protection System. Then part of the payloads for its next mission are installed and checked out.
There are three such facilities, OPF-1, OPF-2, and OPF-3, at the Kennedy Space Center in Florida. OPF-1 and OPF-2 are connected together with a low bay in between them, while OPF-3 is across the street. They are located west of the Vehicle Assembly Building, where the orbiter is mated with its External Tank and Solid Rocket Boosters before launch.
Currently, OPF-1 contains Atlantis, OPF-2 contains Endeavour and OPF-3 is assigned to Discovery, which is currently on launchpad 39B in readiness for mission STS-116.
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| Space Shuttle Program | |
|---|---|
| Image:Shuttle Patch.png | Main Articles: Space Shuttle program | Space Shuttle |
| Components: Orbiter | SRB | External Tank | SSME | OMS | Crawler Transporter | |
| 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 | |
| Mockup Shuttles: Pathfinder | Explorer | America | |
| Misc: Missions | Cancelled Missions | Decision | Crews | Abort modes | In Fiction | |
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