American Skylab Space Station orbiting high above Earth's surface.
Image found on the internet
On May 14, 1973, a modified Saturn V rocket took off from Kennedy Space Center in Florida of the country of the United States of America. It carried in its thrid stage the first American space station, Skylab.
The Skylab space station was built upon the idea of trying to find a way to turn the third stage of the Saturn V rocket, which had hitherto been used for the Apollo lunar missions, into a space station. The result was a very successful design which lasted five years in orbit.
Although not as successful as its Russian counterparts, Mir and Salyut, Skylab did have many accomplishments. It's primary scientific instrument was the Apollo telescope mount (ATM). The ATM was originally designed to be attached to the service module of an Apollo space capsule, but was deemed better used on the space station. This telescope made a number of advanced observations of Earth's sun, in addition to the rest of the universe.
After the end of the Apollo lunar missions with Apollo 17, there were still 4 Apollo space capsules left. Three of these capsules were used throughout the lifetime of Skylab to ferry crew to and from the station, while the forth was kept in reserve to rescue the crew if the currently docked ferry vehicle was unusable for some reason. This rescue ship was outfitted to carry a crew of five. But, because of a lack of launch windows available to the rescue ship, it would have taken up to 48 days to rescue the crew of Skylab if needed. Luckily, the rescue vehicle was never needed.
After three missions, the Skylab space station was departed from for the final time. The crew boosted the station into a higher orbit before leaving, attempting to keep in orbit for a bit longer. A plan had been suggested to try and use the Apollo service module engine to make a controlled reentry for the station, but this was deemed too risky for the crew. There was also a plan in the works to send one of the Enterprise class space shuttles up to rescue the station, but as the shuttle program was going through many development problems at the time, none of the shuttles were ready in time to save Skylab. The stationed plumetted to Earth on July 11, 1980. The pieces that survivied reentry ended up crashing in Perth, Australia, in a luckily low populated area where no life was lost. In fact, no one even noticed it. Flight controllers had planned on bringing the station down in the Indian Ocean, but it had not broken apart in the same way that they had planned.
Length: 14.7 meters
Diameter: 6.6 meters
Crew: 3
Propulsion: Chemical attitude control thrusters