Endeavour, teacher safely on Earth(see landing video and post-landing damage shots below)

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The space shuttle Endeavour touched down safely at the Kennedy Space Center, its wheels slapping down on the three-mile landing strip at about 225 mph at approximately 12:32 p.m.

The orbiter, piloted by Commander Scott Kelly, made a smooth approach over the Space Coast from the south before reaching the spaceport. Kelly set the orbiter down dead on the center line of the runway. Click here to watch landing video.

"Wheels stop Endeavour. Congratulations. Welcome home. You've given a new meaning to higher education," astronaut Chris Ferguson radioed the spaceship from Mission Control after the craft rolled to a stop at KSC.

Touchdown image: Endeavour just over the runway in photograph by FLORIDA TODAY's Michael R. Brown, who was at the north end of the strip. Click on picture for a larger version.


Ferguson's call was in reference to Endeavour delivering a teacher to space and safely bringing her home. Mission specialist Barbara Morgan, a former Idaho school teacher, spent two weeks in space operating the robot arm, helping transfer supplies to the International Space Station and conducting lessons for students back on Earth.

Morgan was the backup to the first teacher in space Christa McAuliffe, who was killed with six crewmates in a launch disaster in 1986. Morgan went back to teaching but later applied to join the astronaut corps.

Morgan got a great view of the descent and landing, sitting in the middle seat on the flight deck for the ride back through the atmosphere to the Earth.

For the hour so after touchdown, the convoy of support vehicles surrounded the orbiter on the KSC runway. Work remains underway this afternoon to finish readying Endeavour for moving it back to its hangar. All appears well so far. The crew is off the spaceship.

Image at right: Endeavour's heat-shield damage on the ground in this shot taken from NASA TV minutes after landing. Click on the picture for a larger version.




Commander Kelly and his crewmates will get a chance to walk underneath the vehicle and inspect its condition, a normal practice post-flight. They'll certainly go get a look at that gouge in the tiles that got so much attention during the mission, and apparently held up during re-entry as predicted by NASA's engineering analysis.

Already, KSC Director Bill Parsons and Administrator Mike Griffin have taken a look, pointing just as NASA TV camera crews got a live image of the damage site.

Click here to watch Patrick Peterson's video of landing.