While on the pad, problems were detected with
Challenger main engines and repairs began. During this time, a severe storm contaminated TDRS-1 while it was in the Payload Change-out Room on the
Rotating Service Structure at the launch pad. The satellite had to be returned to its checkout facility, where it was cleaned and rechecked.
Challenger finally lifted off from
Launch Complex 39A of the
Kennedy Space Center at 18:30:00 UTC on 4 April 1983.
Operations Following deployment from
Challenger, TDRS-1 was to be raised to its operational
geosynchronous orbit by means of an
Inertial Upper Stage having two
solid rocket motors, the first used to raise the orbital
apogee, the second its
perigee. The first burn was successful, but the Inertial Upper Stage went out of control during the second burn. TDRS-1 separated from the upper stage in a lower than planned orbit. It was eventually raised to geosynchronous orbit using its
attitude control system. To achieve this, a team of engineers from the
Goddard Space Flight Center in
Greenbelt,
Maryland worked for nearly three months using six one-pound thrusters on the errant satellite to push it higher in space. The failure was later identified as a collapsed second-stage nozzle techroll seal, a flexible ring which allows the nozzle to pivot and provide directional control. In 1989 satellite operations were affected by a
geomagnetic storm. TDRS-1 formed part of the first pole-to-pole phone call on 28 April 1999, with TDRS-1 being used at the South Pole, and an
Iridium phone being used at the North Pole (recorded in
Ripley's Believe It Or Not and
Guinness World Records in April 1999).
Mission duration TDRS-1 had a design life of ten years, but in April 2008, it remained operational on the twenty-fifth anniversary of its launch. Over the years, the
orbital inclination was allowed to increase so that, for portions of the day (approximately 5 hours), it could be used for communications with the
North and then the
South Pole. Along with
Marisat F2,
GOES 3 and
LES-9, it was one of a number of satellites that were transferred to the US
National Science Foundation in 1998, for communications with the
Amundsen–Scott South Pole Station. After Marisat was retired, TDRS-1 became the primary means of communication with the research station. , NASA repositioned
TDRS-3 to assume the duties of TDRS-1. == See also ==