Skylab Skylab Skylab was a United States space station launched and operated by NASA, and occupied for about 24 weeks between May 1973 and February 1974 – the only space station the U.S. has operated exclusively. In 1979 it fell back to Earth amid huge worldwide media attention. Skylab included a workshop, a solar observatory, and other systems necessary for crew survival and scientific experiments. It was launched unmanned by a modified Saturn V rocket, with a weight of . Lifting Skylab into low earth orbit was the final mission and launch of a Saturn V rocket (famous for carrying the
Assembly of the International Space Station combinations. The last two Shuttle flights added one of the two final elements of ISS, followed by a Proton launch to deliver the European Robotic Arm in 2019. Other assembly flights consisted of modules lifted by the Russian Proton rocket or in the case of Pirs and Poisk by a Soyuz-U rocket. Some of the larger modules include: The space station is located in orbit around the Earth at an altitude of approximately , a type of orbit usually termed low Earth orbit (the actual height varies over time by several kilometers due to atmospheric drag and reboosts). It orbits