KSC-04-S-00305

Kennedy Space Center in Florida is marking another milestone among its exciting achievements -- the completion of its first fully assembled Space Shuttle Main Engine. The engine, known as SSME 2058, is the first of five engines to be built entirely at KSC. Processing and assembly work on the engine began in February. Now, with assembly and avionics testing behind them, technicians in the Space Center's SSME processing facility are preparing the engine for its next trial. It's heading for NASA's Stennis Space Center in Mississippi, where it will go through a hot fire acceptance test. Then it's back to KSC, where the 7,800-pound engine is set to fly on Shuttle Atlantis on STS-115, no earlier than September 2005. Every Space Shuttle uses three of the 14-foot-long engines, which provide nearly 400,000 pounds of thrust each. The engines are manufactured for NASA by The Boeing Company's Rocketdyne Propulsion and Power division. The ultimate goal is to have 15 of the engines ready for launch at any given time.