Saturn A-1, studied in 1959, was projected to be the first version of

Saturn I The Saturn I was a rocket designed as the United States' first medium lift launch vehicle for up to low Earth orbit Payload (air and space craft), payloads.Terminology has changed since the 1960s; back then, 20,000 pounds was considered "heavy l ...

and was to be used if necessary before the

S-IV The S-IV was the Multistage rocket, second stage of the Saturn I rocket used by NASA for early flights in the Apollo program. The S-IV was manufactured by the Douglas Aircraft Company and later modified by them to the S-IVB, a similar but distinc ...

liquid

hydrogen Hydrogen is a chemical element; it has chemical symbol, symbol H and atomic number 1. It is the lightest and abundance of the chemical elements, most abundant chemical element in the universe, constituting about 75% of all baryon, normal matter ...

second stage became available. It was designed as a three stage vehicle. The S-I first stage (initially proposed for the Juno V rocket and eventually used on

) would propel the Saturn A-1 into space, continuing the flight with a Titan I missile based second stage. Finally a

Centaur A centaur ( ; ; ), occasionally hippocentaur, also called Ixionidae (), is a creature from Greek mythology with the upper body of a human and the lower body and legs of a horse that was said to live in the mountains of Thessaly. In one version o ...

C high-energy double-engine third stage could send a payload into its final Earth orbit or to other planets. The Saturn A-1 never flew, but all proposed stages were used on different launch vehicles. Today, they are all retired.

References

* * {{Saturns Cancelled space launch vehicles Saturn A

See also

References