NASA's last shuttle seen from space

DigitalGlobe

The space shuttle Atlantis is visible near the center of this DigitalGlobe satellite image, focusing on the heart of NASA's Kennedy Space Center in Florida. The large structure toward the left is the 52-story-tall Vehicle Assembly Building, where the shuttle was being taken in preparation for flight. The building just to the left of the VAB is the Launch Control Center. The buildings at top center are orbiter processing facilities, the "garages" where the space shuttles are kept.

By Alan Boyle, Science Editor, NBC News

This picture turns the tables on the space shuttle Atlantis: Usually, the orbiter gets great views of Earth from space. Here, a satellite in space gets a great view of the orbiter on Earth. It's even more amazing when you realize that DigitalGlobe's satellte happened to be passing over Kennedy Space Center at midday on Tuesday, at just the time when NASA was moving Atlantis over from its orbiter processing facility to the 52-story-tall Vehicle Assembly Building.

Atlantis is now being mated with its external fuel tank and solid rocket boosters inside the VAB, in preparation for NASA's final space shuttle mission. Right now the launch is scheduled to take place in mid-July. Check out this preview story to learn more about Atlantis' "rollover" and the STS-135 mission ahead. And for a ground-level view of the rollover, check out this picture and the others available from Kennedy Space Center's media archive:

NASA

The shuttle Atlantis is parked in front of the Vehicle Assembly Building on Tuesday before being moved inside.

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More about the shuttle fleet's last days:

Tip o' the Log to Ian O'Neill at Discovery News.

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Explore related topics: space, featured, nasa, atlantis, cosmic-log, sts-135

RICK10-2561617

God bless america !!!!!!!!!!!!!!

2 votes

#1 - Fri May 20, 2011 5:42 AM EDT

mob_barley

Rock on Rick! God Bless America! It's going to be a wonderful 4th of July. Here's to a successful final Space Shuttle mission.

1 vote

#1.1 - Fri May 20, 2011 1:00 PM EDT

TB22

Amazing how small the orbiter looks compared to the Vehicle Assembly Building. Gives a good idea of how massive the Saturn V's must have been.

#2 - Fri May 20, 2011 11:31 AM EDT

dman-353357

The story makes me wonder if mankind will ever set foot on Mars. When I was an adolescent, it was generally assumed this would happen by 1985. That seemed a long time in the future ..then. Now its seems impossibly far in the past, and a mission to land a man on Mars is not even on the drawing board.