Kennedy Space Center - Facilities

Facilities

Facilities at the Kennedy Space Center are directly related to its mission to launch, and in some cases recover, manned and unmanned missions. Facilities are available to prepare and maintain spacecraft and payloads for flight. The headquarters (HQ) building houses offices for the Center Director, library, film and photo archives, a print shop and security.

Payloads are received processed and integrated together in the Operations and Checkout (OC) building dating back to the 1960s with the Gemini and Apollo programs, 70s with the Skylab program and 80s and 90s for initial segments of the International Space Station. The three-story, 457,000 square feet (42,500 m2) Space Station Processing Facility (SSPF) consists of two processing bays, an airlock, operational control rooms, laboratories, logistics areas and office space for support of non-hazardous Station and Shuttle payloads to ISO 14644-1 class 5 standards. The Vertical Processing Facility (VPF) features a 71 feet (22 m) x 38 feet (12 m) door where payloads which are processed in the vertical position are brought in and manipulated with 2 overhead cranes and a hoist capable of lifting up to 35 short tons (32 t). The Hypergolic Maintenance and Checkout Facility (HMCF) comprises three buildings which are isolated from the rest of the industrial area because of the hazardous materials handled there. Hypergolic-fueled modules that make up the space shuttles orbiter's reaction control system, orbital maneuvering system and auxiliary power units are stored and serviced in the HMCF.