Payload Assist Module

<h2 id="2001-re-entry-incident">2001 re-entry incident</h2>
<p>On January 12, 2001, a PAM-D module re-entered the atmosphere after a "catastrophic orbital decay".<a class="footnote-ref" id="fnref:5" href="#fn:5"><sup>5</sup></a> The PAM-D stage, which had been used to launch the <a href="/facts/Global_Positioning_System/DKVLnzF3">GPS satellite</a> <a href="/facts/USA-91/XCXNDCV3">2A-11</a> in 1993, crashed in the sparsely populated <a href="/facts/Saudi_Arabia/uyUpe1J2">Saudi Arabian</a> desert, where it was positively identified.<a class="footnote-ref" id="fnref:6" href="#fn:6"><sup>6</sup></a>
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<h2 id="gallery">Gallery</h2>

<h2 id="external-links">External links</h2>

Wikimedia Commons has media related to Payload Assist Module.

<ul><li><a href="https://science.ksc.nasa.gov/shuttle/technology/sts-newsref/carriers.html#pam-d">Payload Assist Module</a> <a href="https://web.archive.org/web/20161221070222/http://science.ksc.nasa.gov/shuttle/technology/sts-newsref/carriers.html#pam-d">Archived</a> 2016-12-21 at the <a href="/facts/Wayback_Machine/nmQ3a6JC">Wayback Machine</a> at the NASA Shuttle Reference Manual</li>
<li><a href="http://www.globalsecurity.org/space/systems/pam.htm">Payload Assist Module</a> at GlobalSecurity.org</li></ul>

<h2 id="references">References</h2>

<ol>
<li id="fn:1"><p>"Payload Assist Module (PAM)". Global Security. Retrieved June 8, 2012. <a href="http://www.globalsecurity.org/space/systems/pam.htm" target="_blank">http://www.globalsecurity.org/space/systems/pam.htm</a> <a href="#fnref:1" class="footnote-back-ref">↩</a></p></li>
<li id="fn:2"><p>Krebs, Gunter D. "PAM-D, PAM-D2, PAM-S". Gunter's Space Page. Retrieved 2024-01-05. <a href="https://space.skyrocket.de/doc_stage/pam-d.htm" target="_blank">https://space.skyrocket.de/doc_stage/pam-d.htm</a> <a href="#fnref:2" class="footnote-back-ref">↩</a></p></li>
<li id="fn:3"><p>Krebs, Gunter D. "PAM-D, PAM-D2, PAM-S". Gunter's Space Page. Retrieved 2024-01-05. <a href="https://space.skyrocket.de/doc_stage/pam-d.htm" target="_blank">https://space.skyrocket.de/doc_stage/pam-d.htm</a> <a href="#fnref:3" class="footnote-back-ref">↩</a></p></li>
<li id="fn:4"><p>Krebs, Gunter D. "PAM-D, PAM-D2, PAM-S". Gunter's Space Page. Retrieved 2024-01-05. <a href="https://space.skyrocket.de/doc_stage/pam-d.htm" target="_blank">https://space.skyrocket.de/doc_stage/pam-d.htm</a> <a href="#fnref:4" class="footnote-back-ref">↩</a></p></li>
<li id="fn:5"><p>"PAM-D Debris Falls in Saudi Arabia" (PDF). The Orbital Debris Quarterly News. 6 (2). NASA Johnson Space Center: 1. April 2001. <a href="https://orbitaldebris.jsc.nasa.gov/quarterly-news/pdfs/odqnv6i2.pdf" target="_blank">https://orbitaldebris.jsc.nasa.gov/quarterly-news/pdfs/odqnv6i2.pdf</a> <a href="#fnref:5" class="footnote-back-ref">↩</a></p></li>
<li id="fn:6"><p>"PAM-D Debris Falls in Saudi Arabia" (PDF). The Orbital Debris Quarterly News. 6 (2). NASA Johnson Space Center: 1. April 2001. <a href="https://orbitaldebris.jsc.nasa.gov/quarterly-news/pdfs/odqnv6i2.pdf" target="_blank">https://orbitaldebris.jsc.nasa.gov/quarterly-news/pdfs/odqnv6i2.pdf</a> <a href="#fnref:6" class="footnote-back-ref">↩</a></p></li>
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Payload Assist Module open-in-new

Payload Assist Module