Bill Nelson Nelson was a Payload Specialist on 's STS-61-C mission from January 12 to 18, 1986. The Space Shuttle "Columbia" landed at Edwards AFB at 5:59 a.m. PST, on January 18. The mission's elapsed time was 6 days, 2 hours, 45 minutes, and 51 seconds. This flight was the last successful space shuttle flight prior to the "Challenger" accident, which occurred only ten days after the return of the "Columbia". In 1988, Nelson published a book about his space flight experience entitled "Mission: An American Congressman's Voyage to Space". In 1972, Nelson was elected to the Florida House of Representatives as
Space Shuttle machine "Space Shuttle" was produced by Zaccaria and a 1984 pinball machine "Space Shuttle: Pinball Adventure" was produced by Williams and features a plastic Space Shuttle model among other artwork of astronauts on the play field. The Space Shuttle also appears in a number of flight simulator and space flight simulator games such as "Microsoft Space Simulator", "Orbiter", "FlightGear", "X-Plane" and Space Shuttle Mission 2007. Several Transformers toys were modeled after the Space Shuttle. The U.S. Postal Service has released several postage issues that depict the Space Shuttle. The first such stamps were issued in 1981, and are on display