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The distance of a light year. How long would it take the space shuttle to go one light-year? The shuttle orbits the Earth at about 5 miles per second (18,000 mph). Light travels at 186,000 miles per second, which is about 37,200 times faster than the shuttle. So the shuttle would need about 37,200 years to go one light-year.
A light year is the distance that light can travel in a year, or: 186,000 miles/second * 60 seconds/minute * 60 minutes/hour * 24 hours/day * 365 days/year = 5,865,696,000,000 miles/year. A light year is 5,865,696,000,000 miles (9,460,800,000,000 kilometers). That's a long way! Using a light year as a distance measurement has another advantage -- it helps you determine age. Let's say that a star is 1 million light years away. The light from that star has traveled at the speed of light to reach us.