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space shuttle
noun
: a reusable spacecraft designed to transport people and cargo between earth and space
Examples of space shuttle in a Sentence
Recent Examples on the Web
The proceedings commemorated the lives lost in NASA's three space tragedies — the Apollo 1 fire in January 1967, the space shuttle Challenger explosion in January 1986 and the shuttle Columbia disaster in February 2003.
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Mike Wall, Space.com, 23 Jan. 2025
The event remembers the crews of Apollo 1 and the space shuttles Challenger and Columbia.
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Andrew Torgan, CNN, 19 Jan. 2025
At over 320 feet tall (98 meters), New Glenn is shorter than an Apollo-era Saturn V (363 ft., or 111 m) but taller than both the space shuttle when it was fully stacked (184 ft., or 64 m) and SpaceX’s Falcon 9 (229 ft., or 70 m).
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Wendy Whitman Cobb, The Conversation, 16 Jan. 2025
Nelson flew aboard space shuttle Columbia in 1986 — on the flight before the Challenger disaster — while a congressman.
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Marcia Dunn, Los Angeles Times, 4 Dec. 2024
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Word History
First Known Use
1950, in the meaning defined above
Dictionary Entries Near space shuttle
Cite this Entry
“Space shuttle.” Merriam-Webster.com Dictionary, Merriam-Webster, https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/space%20shuttle. Accessed 5 Feb. 2025.
Kids Definition
space shuttle
noun
: a spacecraft designed to transport people and cargo between earth and space that can be used repeatedly
More from Merriam-Webster on space shuttle
Nglish: Translation of space shuttle for Spanish Speakers
Britannica.com: Encyclopedia article about space shuttle
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