Explorer-Class Shuttle

The Explorer-Class is a retired class of reusable heavy lift spacecraft operated by KASA. Succeeded by the Agera-Class Spaceplane and Hermes Rocket Family.

The Explorer-Class Shuttle partially replaced the previous Artemis Rocket Family as KASA primary heavy launch vehicle. While the Artemis was designed for manned off Kerbin missions, the shuttles were designed to deliver heavy payloads into LKO for a much lower price over Artemis series rockets.

As such, the Explorer lacked the pure lifting grunt of the Artemis, but was much cheaper. The Explorer never really lived up to the expectation. The Explorers were costly to maintain, and had a spotty track record, resulting in the loss of the Atlantis and Enterprise (without loss of life thankfully).

However, these vehicles were crucial in maintain SpaceLab launching the bulk of communications satellites and early probes to other planets.

The hardware used on the Explorer's would become widespread and used on a plethora of rockets, most notably the Hermes Rocket.

Explorer (OV-097)
-Destroyed

Challenger (OV-099)
-Launched Juno and Hera into orbit (TSO-002)

Enterprise (OV-100)
-Destroyed during reentry

Atlantis (OV-103)
-Destroyed, crashed after bad launch. Crew recovered