Thursday, March 27, 2008

Endeavour wraps up impressive mission


Some nice video of Endeavour's landing last night at the Kennedy Space Center following the completion of STS-123. Their mission was far from ordinary as they delivered Dextre, a crazy space construction robot; and the first component of Kibo, Japan's contribution to the ISS. The mission was also the first to use the Station-to-Shuttle Power Transfer System where Endeavour was able to be powered by the ISS while docked, allowing for a longer mission. Too bad this feature is online late in the shuttle fleet's life as this would have been beneficial earlier on in the building phases of the ISS. The next shuttle mission should have Discovery bringing the other portion of the Kibo lab by the end of May. Up next for the ISS is the automated docking of ESA's Jules Verne ATV which will provide the station crew supplies and be capable of boosting the ISS to a higher orbit.

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