Named after US president Lyndon B Johnson, the space centre is located some 30 km south-east of Houston. Established in 1961, it is the prime training site for US astronauts. Its training facilities include flight simulators and a water tank for spacewalk simulation. There is also a centrifuge for simulating the g-forces astronauts experience on lift-off. Johnson is a lead centre for the development of the Freedom space station. Also located at the centre is manned spaceflight mission control, whose callsign 'Houston' became internationally famous during the Apollo Moon-landing missions. Johnson manages NASA's White Sands Test Facility in New Mexico. This outpost, among other things, is a ground station for receiving communications from TDRS, the tracking and data relay satellites NASA now relies on for space- Earth communications.
