Payload bay doors closing: 1st step to re-entry

Endeavour's payload bay doors are closing at about 8:40 a.m. EDT, the first step toward re-entry. If all goes as scheduled, the first deorbit burn would come at 11:25 a.m., with landing at 12:32 p.m. at Kennedy Space Center.

Endeavour has a forecast "Go" for landing a KSC today.

Endeavour would land from the northwest on runway 15 at KSC, which is 15,000 feet long and about 300 feet wide. The weather looks favorable today, with slight to little chance of showers. A 10-knot crosswind is expected.

Educator/Astronaut Barbara Morgan will sit on the flight deck for the ride home, where she will get a better view of re-entry than in her mid-deck seat during launch. At re-entry Endeavour would fly at a 40 degree angle of attack. As the craft enters the atmosphere, the rudder and elevons would take over steering from the thrusters.

The flight path will take the orbiter over the southern tip of central America, across the Gulf toward the Miami area.

The shuttle will use a new Global Satellite Positioning navigation system until just before landing.

Here's a look at the ground track, which is slightly different from missions of the recent path and would bring the spaceship north along the Atlantic coast line into the Shuttle Landing Facility today:



That path should give residents of the Space Coast a treat: the twin sonic booms that herald the orbiter's arrival home will be much louder over southern and central Brevard. They would come just a few minutes before landing.

In the case the weather doesn't work out, here's a list of all of the landing opportunities on Tuesday, Wednesday and Thursday: Landing Opportunities & Times.