Atlantis Completes Final Mission Flawlessly

May 27, 2010 — It has traveled nearly 154 million miles in its 32 flights to the International Space Station. But when space shuttle Atlantis landed Wednesday morning at Cape Canaveral after a 12-day mission, it marked the beginning of a new chapter in its life — retirement. The flawless landing at 8:48 a.m. EDT at Kennedy Space Center wrapped up a successful mission to deliver the Russian-built Mini Research Module-1, known as "Rassvet," or “dawn” in Russian, to the orbiting output. "My hat's off to the team. They make it look easy," said Bill Gerstenmaier, associate administrator of Space Operations. "I can tell you it wasn't easy, and they deserve a lot of praise and congratulations for what they've done." Mike Moses, space shuttle launch integration manager, spoke highly of everyone who built and maintained Atlantis during the orbiter's 25 years of service. "The folks who built it, all the missions it's flown over its career, have been just amazing. I can't even begin to talk about how proud I am of Atlantis and the whole team." Led by Commander Ken Ham, the all-veteran astronaut crew included Pilot Tony Antonelli and Mission Specialists Garrett Reisman, Michael Good, Steve Bowen and Piers Sellers. The mission's three spacewalks focused on replacing and installing components outside the station, including replacing six batteries, installing a communications antenna and adding parts to the Canadian Dextre robotic arm. Atlantis, which was towed to its processing facility later Wednesday, will now go through the normal flow of prelaunch preparations in order to serve as the "launch-on-need" vehicle for Endeavour's STS-134 mission, the last scheduled flight of the space shuttle program. That flight currently is targeted for November. However, space shuttle Discovery is set to launch in September 2010, delivering the Leonardo Permanent Multipurpose Module to house experiments. STS-133 also will bring critical spare components and a cargo carrier to the station. In addition, Robonaut 2, or R2, will be the first human-like robot in space when it flies on Discovery to become a permanent resident of the station.		Space shuttle Atlantis makes its final approach to Kennedy Space Center Wednesday. Photo credit: NASA Atlantis touched down at 8:48 a.m. EDT Wednesday, marking its last flight before retirement. Photo credit: NASA Space shuttle Atlantis lands Wednesday at Kennedy Space Center. Photo credit: NASA

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