NASA has published the remaining shuttle flights manifest. Ten more space shuttle missions before the fleet is decommissioned; that’s it:
The manifest includes one flight to the Hubble Space Telescope, seven assembly flights to the International Space Station, and two station contingency flights, planned to be completed before the end of fiscal year 2010. The agency previously selected Oct. 8 and Nov. 10 as launch dates for Atlantis’ STS-125 mission to service Hubble and Endeavour’s STS-126 / ULF-2 mission to supply the space station and service both Solar Alpha Rotary Joints on the port and starboard end of its truss backbone that supports equipment and solar arrays.
This is emotional for those of us who have worked on such awesome Bird… but it time for the next phase of the space program… If all goes as planned, the future of the U.S. manned space program will be based on the Ares Launch Vehicles and the Orion Crew Vehicles.
…and then, to the Moon!
See NASA Constellation Multimedia.
Godspeed!
ceo