What is one way that Saturn V rockets and space shuttles are different?

One way that the Saturn V and space shuttles are different is that the Saturn V was designed to be expendable, which means that it can only be used once, whereas space shuttles are used more than once.

• The Saturn V

This was used by NASA's Skylab and Apollo programs from 1967 up until 1973.  In all, 13 Saturn Vs were launched throughout this timescale and there were never any losses, either of crew or of payload.

The Saturn V still holds the record after all of these years for being the largest rocket in terms of height, weight and power, as well as the record for being able to carry the heaviest payload upon takeoff.

• Design

The design of the Saturn V was undertaken at the Marshall Space Flight Center, which is in Alabama. Arthur Rudolph and Wernher von Braun were responsible for the design, and the main contractors were IBM; the Douglas Aircraft Company; Boeing; and North American Aviation.

The design was based upon the work that Von Braun did in Germany in the Second World War on the series of rockets that were known as Aggregate, particularly the A-12, the A-11 and the A-10.

Up to now, the Saturn V is the only rocket that has been designed and built that is capable of carrying people further than low earth orbit, which actually means, to the moon (something that the space shuttle cannot do, so there is another difference). Between 1968 and 1972, 24 men made this journey.

• Wernher von Braun

He was one scientist out of 700 Germans brought together by President Truman in 1946 to take part in Operation Paperclip. This was a program that had been designed to make sure that the United States would have an upper hand in the Cold War.