page_title: NASA
section_title: Facilities
hierarchical_section_title: NASA / Facilities
caption_attribution_description: English: The Solid Rocket Booster retrieval ship Liberty Star is seen in front of Kennedy Space Center's Vehicle Assembly Building and Launch Control Center.
context_page_description: The National Aeronautics and Space Administration is an independent agency of the U.S. Federal Government responsible for the civilian space program, as well as aeronautics and space research.
  NASA was established in 1958, succeeding the National Advisory Committee for Aeronautics. The new agency was to have a distinctly civilian orientation, encouraging peaceful applications in space science. Since its establishment, most US space exploration efforts have been led by NASA, including the Apollo Moon landing missions, the Skylab space station, and later the Space Shuttle. NASA is supporting the International Space Station and is overseeing the development of the Orion spacecraft, the Space Launch System, and Commercial Crew vehicles. The agency is also responsible for the Launch Services Program, which provides oversight of launch operations and countdown management for uncrewed NASA launches.
context_section_description: NASA Headquarters in Washington, DC provides overall guidance and political leadership to the agency's ten field centers, through which all other facilities are administered. The ten field centers are:
  John F. Kennedy Space Center (KSC) is one of the best-known NASA facilities. It has been the launch site for every U.S. human space flight since 1968. KSC manages and operates rocket launch facilities for America's civilian space program from three pads at the adjoining Cape Canaveral Air Force Station. NASA also operates a short-line railroad at KSC and uses special aircraft.
  Lyndon B. Johnson Space Center (JSC) in Houston, Texas contains the Christopher C. Kraft Jr. Mission Control Center, where all flight control is managed for crewed space missions. JSC is the lead NASA center for activities regarding the International Space Station and also houses the NASA Astronaut Corps that selects, trains, and provides astronauts as crew members for US and international space missions.
  George C. Marshall Space Flight Center in Huntsville, Alabama is the rocket development center, at which the Saturn V rocket and Skylab were developed.
  Ames Research Center (ARC) at Moffett Field, in California's Silicon Valley, was founded on December 20, 1939. The center was named after Joseph Sweetman Ames, a founding member of the National Advisory Committee for Aeronautics (NACA).
  Armstrong Flight Research Center (formerly Hugh L. Dryden Flight Research Facility), Edwards, California
  Goddard Space Flight Center, Greenbelt, Maryland
  Jet Propulsion Laboratory (JPL) worked together with the Army Ballistic Missile Agency (ABMA), one of the agencies behind Explorer 1, the first American satellite. It is located near Pasadena, California
  Langley Research Center (LaRC), founded in 1917, is the oldest of NASA's field centers, located in Hampton, Virginia. LaRC focuses primarily on aeronautical research, though the Apollo lunar lander was flight-tested at the facility and a number of high-profile spacecraft have been planned and designed on-site. Langley currently devotes two-thirds of its programs to aeronautics, and the rest to space.
  John H. Glenn Research Center (GRC), formerly the Lewis Flight Propulsion Laboratory, located in Brook Park, Ohio, was established in 1942 as a laboratory for aircraft engine research. John H. Glenn Research Center, Cleveland, Ohio
  John C. Stennis Space Center, Bay St. Louis, Mississippi
  Subordinate facilities include the Wallops Flight Facility in Wallops Island, Virginia; the Michoud Assembly Facility in New Orleans, Louisiana; the White Sands Test Facility in Las Cruces, New Mexico; and Deep Space Network stations in Barstow, California; Madrid, Spain; and Canberra, Australia.
caption: Vehicle Assembly Building and Launch Control Center at Kennedy Space Center
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