Zvýraznil jsem klíčové pasáže.
https://www.americaspace.com/2016/04/10 ... am-part-2/
"Plunging into the “sensible” atmosphere at Mach 25, subjecting a patchwork of Thermal Protection System (TPS) tiles to extreme re-entry temperatures, and accomplishing an unpowered, “deadstick” touchdown at Edwards were core requirements for the shuttle. Although the last few minutes, from passing subsonic velocity in the low atmosphere to the runway, had been exhaustively rehearsed during Enterprise Approach and Landing Tests (ALTs), the 45 minutes from the “de-orbit” burn of Columbia’s Orbital Maneuvering System (OMS) engines, through the searing furnace of re-entry and
the complex series of aerodynamic turns needed to “bleed off” the craft’s speed and align her for touchdown, were largely unknown. To play things safe, NASA opted to use the wide expanse of dry lakebed at Edwards for the first four test flights.
This offered Young and Crippen a somewhat greater margin for error, although it was anticipated that when the shuttle became fully operational and its aerodynamic performance was better understood, precision landings on a narrower concrete runway at KSC would become the norm. Four hours before landing, at around 9 a.m. EDT on 14 April 1981, the two astronauts closed and latched Columbia’s payload bay doors for the final time."
nebo tady:
https://www.nasa.gov/feature/40-years-a ... weeks-away
"At the end of the mission, Young and Crippen planned to bring Columbia in for a landing at the Dryden Flight Research Center, now NASA’s Armstrong Flight Research Center, at Edwards Air Force Base in California.
For the first landing of the reusable spacecraft, mission managers believed the 5.2-mile long Runway 23 on Rogers Dry Lake provided the greatest margin of safety. The lakebed runway, normally dry and offering a solid surface for the shuttle to land on, had turned soggy due to unseasonably heavy rains earlier in March. The wet conditions caused concerns whether the runway could dry in time to support an April landing. For that reason, mission managers began to consider making Northrup Strip, now the White Sands Space Harbor in New Mexico, as the prime target for STS-1’s landing. Young and Crippen had already practiced landing at Northrup Strip as a designated alternate landing site, as well as at Dryden and KSC’s Shuttle Landing Facility, flying the Shuttle Training Aircraft (STA), a Gulfstream II highly modified to simulate the flying characteristics of the space shuttle. By the time of launch, Young and Crippen will have flown about 1,330 landing approaches in the STA."
Edit:
doufám, že jsem přinesl dostatek zdrojů, potvrzujících, že:
1) Shuttle Landing Facility na Kennedy Space Center byla na přistání Columbie při misi STS-1 v roce 1981 po technické stránce plně připravena
2) Důvodem, proč Columbie při misi STS-1 přistála v Kalifornii na EAFB, bylo poskytnutí větších prostorových rezerv posádce při přistání z prvního testovacího kosmického letu.
Tím s tímto tématem končím. Snad to Adhaře poskytlo dostatečně podloženou odpověď na její otázku.
Všimněte si, že v S-IC byla také posádka, která s ním přistávala 
