The Untold Stories of the Space Shuttle Program

Davide Sivolella is an aerospace engineer living and working in the UK with experience in the airline and aircraft manufacturing industries.. As a child, Davide developed a fascination with all kinds of flying machines, especially those that travel above the atmosphere. In fact, this passion for astronautics led him to pursue a bachelor’s and master’s degrees in Aerospace Engineering from the Polytechnic of Turin (Italy). Born in July 1981, just a few months after the Columbia’s maiden flight, he developed a fondness for the Space Shuttle program. Eventually, this resulted in Springer-Praxis publishing in August 2013 his first book, To Orbit and Back Again: How the Space Shuttle Flew in Space. The book has been praised on numerous outlets.  A sequel entitled “The Space Shuttle Program: Technologies and Accomplishments” was released in 2017. This new book, “The Untold Stories of the Space Shuttle Program”, complements its predecessors by showing what the Space Shuttle could have achieved and how the Space Transportation System could have been further matured. Davide Sivolella is an aerospace engineer living and working in the UK as a specialist in the design of aircraft structural repairs of civil airliners. Currently, he is employed by British Airways at London Heathrow Airport. As a child, Davide developed a fascination with all kinds of flying machines, especially those that travel above the atmosphere. In fact, this passion for astronautics led him to pursue a bachelor’s and master’s degrees in Aerospace Engineering from the Polytechnic of Turin (Italy). Born in July 1981, just a few months after the Columbia’s maiden flight, he developed a fondness for the Space Shuttle program. Eventually, this resulted in Springer-Praxis publishing in August 2013 his first book, To Orbit and Back Again: How the Space Shuttle Flew in Space. The book has been praised on numerous outlets. In July 2017, Springer published The Space Shuttle Program: Technologies and Accomplishments, which has already received excellent reviews on major space advocacy and space news platforms such as the National Space Society and The Space Review.

Chapter 1: Space Shuttle 101.- Chapter 2: Making the most of the External Tank.- Chapter 3: Boosting the boosters.- Chapter 4: Improving performance.- Chapter 5: Outposts for the development of space.- Chapter 6: Orbital hopping.- Chapter 7: Unflown satellite servicing capabilities.- Chapter 8: In-space assembly: a potential not fully exploited.- Chapter 9: Factories in space.- Chapter 10: The unfulfilled potential of the External Tank.- Chapter 11: Space Shuttle freighter.- Chapter 12: The quest for a worthy successor.- Chapter 13: An impossible schedule.- Chapter 14: Space Shuttle and Skylab: a missed opportunity.- Chapter 15: Unflown science.- Chapter 16: Space Shuttle in Uniform: A lost collaboration.- Chapter 17: Too high a dream?.