Atlantis ends its final voyage and an era in space

Cape Canaveral, Florida: The last space shuttle flight rolled to a stop just before 6 a.m. on Thursday, closing an era of the nation's space program.

"Mission complete, Houston," said Capt. Christopher J. Ferguson of the Navy, commander of the shuttle Atlantis for the last flight. "After serving the world for over 30 years, the space shuttle has earned its place in history, and it's come to a final stop."

It was the 19th night landing at the Kennedy Space Center in Florida to end the 135th space shuttle mission. For Atlantis, the final tally of its 26-year career is 33 missions, accumulating just short of 126 million miles during 307 days in space, circumnavigating the Earth 4,848 times.

A permanent marker will be placed on the runway to indicate the final resting spot of the space shuttle program.

The last day in space went smoothly. Late on Wednesday night, the crew awoke to the Kate Smith version of "God Bless America." With no weather or technical concerns, the crew closed the payload doors at 2:09 a.m. on Thursday.

At 4:13 a.m., Barry E. Wilmore, an astronaut at mission control in Houston, told the Atlantis crew, "Everything is looking fantastic, there you are go for the deorbit burn, and you can manoeuvre on time."

"That's great, Butch," replied Captain Ferguson. "Go on the deorbit manoeuvre, on time."

Thirty-six minutes later, as it was passing over Malaysia, Atlantis fired its manoeuvring engines for 3 minutes 16 seconds, slowing it down by 225 miles per hour and beginning the fall back into the Earth's atmosphere.

The shuttle, which travels backward while in orbit, flipped around to a nose-first position. Its descending northeast trajectory passed over the southeast Pacific Ocean and crossed Central America toward Florida.

At NASA centers around the country, crowds of NASA employees gathered to watch a broadcast of the landing. On the International Space Station, Michael Fossum, a NASA astronaut, floated in the station's windowed cupola segment and saw Atlantis's trail of hot plasma that marked the re-entry path.

Less than 10 minutes before landing, Captain Ferguson described the view out his window.

"Beautiful view of the Yucatán, I think, going right under the wing right now," he said. "It's a gorgeous thing."

"You're looking good to us, Atlantis," Mr. Wilmore responded, but added a correction. "You're just passing the west coast of Florida."

"Huh? O.K.," Captain Ferguson said in surprise. "I'm further than I thought we were."

In the clear, windless predawn, twin sonic booms announced its impending arrival as Atlantis slowed to less than the speed of sound. It made a wide turn in preparation for the approach for its final landing to conclude the 5,284,862-mile trip.

During the 13-day mission, Atlantis ferried 8,000 pounds of supplies and spare parts to the International Space Station. With the retirement of the shuttles, the space station will now rely on Russian, European and Japanese rockets to bring up supplies.

NASA is also counting on two commercial companies, the Space Exploration Technologies Corporation of Hawthorne, Calif., and the Orbital Sciences Corporation of Dulles, Va., to begin cargo flights next year.

For Atlantis, NASA will now begin the work of transforming it into a museum piece. It will be mounted nearby at Kennedy's visitor center.