Editing STS-1 (section)

== Suborbital mission plan ==
During the original planning stages for the early Space Shuttle missions, NASA management under the [[Carter Administration]] felt a need to undertake initial tests of the system prior to the first orbital flight. To that end, [[Vice President of the United States|Vice President]] [[Walter F. Mondale]] as chairman of the [[National Space Council]] suggested a suborbital flight landing at the emergency landing site at [[Dakar, Senegal]]. NASA further suggested that STS-1, instead of being an orbital flight, be used to test the [[Space Shuttle abort modes|Return To Launch Site (RTLS) abort scenario]]. This involved an abort being called in the first few moments after launch, and using its main engines, once the SRBs had been jettisoned, to power it back to the launch site. This scenario, while potentially necessary in the event of an early abort being called, was seen as being extremely dangerous. Young overruled both proposals, and STS-1 went ahead as the first orbital mission.<ref name=test2>{{cite web|url=http://www.tested.com/science/space/460233-space-shuttles-controversial-launch-abort-plan/|title=The Space Shuttle's Controversial Launch Abort Plan|last1=Dunn|first1=Terry|date=February 26, 2014|website=tested.com|access-date=January 3, 2022|archive-date=December 8, 2017|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20171208090538/http://www.tested.com/science/space/460233-space-shuttles-controversial-launch-abort-plan/|url-status=dead}}</ref> The NASA managers were swayed by Young questioning the need for the test, and the weight of his opinion was especially strong as he was someone who not only had been to the Moon twice, but had walked on it.<ref name=test2/> He would fly the Space Shuttle again on the [[STS-9]] mission, a ten-day flight in 1983.

{{blockquote|Let's not practice Russian roulette, because you may have a loaded gun there.|John W. Young on testing the Return To Launch Site Abort.<ref name=test2/>}}