Endeavour has completed a 360-degree back flip about 600 feet below the Internatinal Space Station, and is preparing to back into a docking with the station in less than an hour. Watch the docking live here at The Flame Trench just after 5 p.m. Click on the NASA TV image at left to launch a live viewer.
Follow the sequence of station images and computer animations that to see the progression of Endeavour's back flip, called the Rendezvous Pitch Maneuver.On board the International Space Station, astronaut Mike Fincke reported seeing no signs of damage to Endeavour's heat shields with the naked eye.
"It looks like it was clean and dry, as we say. It looked really good," he told mission controllers in Houston.
Fincke and Greg Chamitoff took hundreds of pictures of the shuttle with 400mm and 800mm cameras that provide image resolutions of three inches and one inch, respectively. Crews on the ground will carefully analyze the photos for any signs of damage that could threaten Endeavour during it's re-entry to Earth. The analysis is several days from completion, according to NASA officials.
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