The space shuttle Atlantis departed from the International Space Station on Tuesday, leaving behind a bigger, better powered station.
Over the course of their 11 days in space, the crew installed the station's new truss and power generating solar wings, brought in an older solar wing, and stapled down a loose heat blanket on the shuttle's left engine pod. Now they just need to get home.
Atlantis performed a backflip maneuver in front of the station, to give the astronauts an opportunity to inspect it one last time before departing the station. NASA analysts did see a strange white object drifting past the orbiter but they aren't sure if it came from the shuttle, or the station.
The shuttle has a new crew member on board, NASA astronaut Suni
Williams, who just wrapped up her time aboard the International Space
Station - she swapped with Clayton Anderson. In just the last few days she broke the time-in-space record for a woman, set by Shannon Lucid back in 1996.
The slowly separating spacecraft were clearly visible from the Earth (when overhead), and many photographers captured long-exposure images of the two spacecraft as twin trails in the sky.
The shuttle will fire its engines briefly on Thursday at 12:50 pm EDT, dropping it out of orbit, and putting it on a descent path back through the atmosphere. This is where the recent repairs to the shuttle's heat protection system will be tested.
If all goes well, Atlantis will touch down Thursday at the
Kennedy Space Center in Florida at 1:55 pm EDT. If the weather isn't cooperating, the shuttle can try again on the next orbit about 90
minutes later. If these weather turns as poor as it's threatening, the shuttle will have to land at one of the alternative landing sites; in
California or New Mexico.
