spacetoday.net: Shuttle lands in Florida

Shuttle lands in Florida

Posted: Fri, Jul 31, 2009, 6:07 PM ET (2207 GMT)
STS-127: landing (NASA/KSC)

The space shuttle Endeavour successfully landed in Florida Friday morning, completing a 16-day mission to the International Space Station. Endeavour touched down at the Shuttle Landing Facility at the Kennedy Space Center at 10:48 am EDT (1448 GMT) on its first landing opportunity at the Florida site. Endeavour spent 16 days in space on the STS-127 mission, adding an experiment "porch" to the exterior of the Japanese lab module Kibo and performing five spacewalks to outfit that facility and carry out other work on the station. Endeavour returned with Koichi Wakata, a Japanese astronaut who spent over four months on the station; Tim Kopra, who flew to the station on Endeavour, remained on the ISS after the shuttle departed.