NASA's retired shuttle Endeavour heads to Houston on Monday

Space shuttle Endeavour enters the mate/demate structure at the Kennedy Space Center landing facility where it will be mounted on a modified jumbo jet, Friday, Sept. 14, 2012, in Cape Canaveral, Fla. On Monday morning, Endeavour will make a four-day trip to Los Angeles atop the jumbo jet bound for the California Science Center.(AP Photo/John Raoux)

  CAPE CANAVERAL, FL -- The baby of NASA's space shuttle fleet is about to leave home -- for good.

At sunrise Monday, Endeavour will depart Kennedy Space Center for a museum in California, with a two-day stopover in Houston, home to Mission Control and the astronauts who flew aboard the replacement for the lost shuttle Challenger.

Endeavour is the second of NASA's three retired shuttles to head to a museum. The youngest shuttle will make the four-day trip to Los Angeles atop a modified jumbo jet, bound for the California Science Center. Discovery landed at the Smithsonian Institution's display hangar in Virginia last spring. Atlantis will remain at Kennedy.

After taking off from the former shuttle landing strip Monday morning, Endeavour and its carrier jet will fly low over Kennedy and the beaches of Cape Canaveral, then head west toward NASA points along the Gulf of Mexico. The pair will swoop over Stennis Space Center in Mississippi and Michoud Assembly Facility in New Orleans, where the shuttle booster rockets were made.

Next stop: Ellington Field near NASA's Johnson Space Center in Houston.

Endeavour will remain at Ellington until Wednesday morning so space center employees can see the shuttle up close. Houston had bid for a shuttle; the loss still nags many there. NASA chose New York City as the winner for the shuttle prototype Enterprise, which was relinquished by the Smithsonian to make room for Discovery.

NASA's two other shuttles during the 30-year program, Challenger and Columbia, were destroyed during flight, with 14 astronauts altogether killed.

Endeavour was built to replace Challenger and made its flying debut in 1992, six years after the launch accident. It performed the next-to-last shuttle mission in May and June 2011.

During its 25 missions, Endeavour logged 299 days in space and circled Earth 4,671 times. Total off-the-planet mileage: 122.8 million miles.

After leaving Houston on Wednesday, Endeavour will stop for fuel at Biggs Army Airfield in El Paso, Texas, and then perform a low flyover of the White Sands Test Facility in New Mexico, which served for decades as an emergency shuttle landing site. Then it will head to NASA's Dryden Flight Research Center at Edwards Air Force Base in California, another old shuttle touchdown venue.

On Thursday, Endeavour will fly to Northern California, home to Ames Research Center in Mountain View. NASA plans low-level flights over San Francisco, Sacramento and other major cities before heading to Los Angeles and a late-morning arrival at Los Angeles International Airport.

NASA was mum Thursday regarding the exact times of all these flyovers for security reasons. Officials warned that the weather needed to cooperate to allow for such a full and busy schedule.

The shuttle will make its final 12-mile journey from the airport to the California Science Center, via city streets, on Oct. 12-13. It will go on public display beginning Oct. 30.

Atlantis' road trip -- from a Kennedy Space Center hangar to the visitor complex -- is scheduled for Nov. 2.

NASA retired the shuttle fleet last year under White House direction in order to focus more time and money on travel beyond Earth's orbit, first an asteroid and then Mars in the coming decades.

Private companies, meanwhile, are trying to pick up where NASA left off regarding the International Space Station. Until those businesses can provide spaceships for flying people, U.S. astronauts will need to rely on Russian rockets to get to the orbiting lab.

(Copyright ©2012 by The Associated Press. All Rights Reserved.) Get more Technology News »

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Astronauts talk about Endeavour mission

HOUSTON (KTRK) -- Crowds gathered at Ellington Field Thursday afternoon to welcome back the crew of space shuttle Endeavour. The shuttle returned to Florida Wednesday, making it the next to last mission in the program.

Endeavour's crew spoke individually and each called it both historic and successful. They and a large crowd at Ellington Field admit it was really an emotional time watching the orbiter land, especially since there's only one more mission to go. After landing space shuttle Endeavour for the final time, Commander Mark Kelly says he's glad to be home. "Endeavour performed as if it was brand new," he said. He calls the 16-day, 6.5 million-mile mission a success. It was the shuttle's 25th and final flight. It will now be given a new mission. Endeavour is to sit in California for all to see. "To continue to inspire young people to pursue careers in science and engineering and math, and it's going to do that for a very long time," Kelly said. Kelly's wife, wounded Arizona Congresswoman Gabrielle Giffords, did not attend on Wednesday but his daughters did. Kelly says he couldn't have completed this mission without their support or that of his crew. Several hundred attended the welcome-home celebration. "Very bittersweet," NASA employee Don Walker said. Bittersweet, Walker says, because he witnessed the maiden voyage of Endeavour and knows how much life is left in the orbiter. "I'm also looking forward to what's next," Walker said. Also among the crowd was Gene Horton, who worked for NASA years ago. Seeing the shuttle program come to an end, he says, could be an exciting time. "We're really just at the beginning of understanding the universe and understanding the consequences of exploring," he said. End of shuttle program affecting fans, employees The crew of the space shuttle Endeavour is back in Houston, just one day after their spectacular nighttime landing in Florida. There's just one more flight left, and for the hundreds that work in the shuttle program, that means things will soon be changing. It's a huge 'welcome home' for the crew of Endeavour. It's also bittersweet, as this means there is but one more shuttle mission ever. In its 25 trips into orbit, space shuttle Endeavour logged nearly 123 million miles. It came to a stop at Kennedy Space Center Wednesday one last time. "I teared up. I just teared up," said Pat Reho, a fan of the shuttle program. Reho watched the landing at 1:30am. She says because she knows it is the second to last return of an orbiter -- ever. "It's, you know, the beginning of the end. It saddens me," Reho said. On Thursday, we found Reho among many snapping up souvenirs. Those who run one souvenir store say business is up at least 20 percent. "People are realizing this is it!" said Toni Heath with Space City Souvenirs. For many the return of Endeavour makes the reality that there is only one more shuttle mission left that much more real. Also increasing is the push for jobs. Two-thousand people associated with the shuttle program who live near JSC have already lost their jobs. Two-thousand more are expected once the final mission is completed. Many have turned to the aerospace transition center for help in finding jobs. Looking, this woman says, has been a challenge. "The Corporations are able to be more selective because there really are so many of us available," job seeker Yvonne Vogue-Rodi said. There will actually be an aerospace job fair on June 15 Clear Falls High School. (Copyright ©2011 KTRK-TV/DT. All Rights Reserved.)
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