Tower that lay dormant since 1969 finally gives way to progress.
NASA has demolished a 239-foot-tall structure that engineers once used to test rocket engines that sent astronauts to the moon, toppling it with explosives on Friday despite reservations from state history officials who wanted it preserved.
Contractors working for the National Aeronautics and Space Administration took down the remaining concrete towers of Test Stand 4696 at Redstone Arsenal, home of NASA’s Marshall Space Flight Center.
The tower was built in the early 1960s to test F-1 engines, which helped power Saturn V rockets to the moon. Documents show the tower hadn’t been used for an F-1 test since February 1969, five months before astronauts first landed on the lunar surface.
NASA said it needed to demolish the concrete-and-steel tower to save on maintenance costs and make way for a new structure for testing rocket engines.
