Permanent Space Station

Image credit: McDonnell Douglas
Image source: Numbers Station

NASA Earth Orbital Space Station

Image credit: McDonnell Douglas
Image source: Numbers Station

Phase A Orbiter by Ron Simpson

Image credit: McDonnell Douglas
Image source: Mike Acs

MDC A by Robert McCall

Our World in Space
Robert McCall & Isaac Asimov
New York Graphic Society, 1974

Image credit: Robert McCall
Image source: Mike Acs

McDAC A Alternate

Image credit: McDonnell Douglas
Image source: Numbers Station

The Drawbridge

Image credit: McDonnell Douglas
Image source: Mike Acs

Orbiter & Station

Image credit: McDonnell Douglas

Drawbridge Orbiter

Image credit: McDonnell Douglas
Image source: Mike Acs

Four Space-Shuttle Concepts

Here are examples of tentative designs for a space shuttle, made public by members of the four industrial teams competing in the project:

  1. McDonnell Douglas/Marietta
  2. Boeing/Lockheed
  3. North American/General Dynamics
  4. Grumman Aerospace

Each of pictured space-shuttle versions is a composite craft consisting of two stages, a booster and an orbiter, and is launched vertically like a space rocket, as shown. It’s two stages separate in space, and both return to earth for re-use.

Image credit: Robert McCall
Text and Images: Popular Science

MDAC “Drawbridge”

Image credit: Dennis R. Jenkins Collection
Image source: SDASM Archives