Last week, amidst massive crowds and plenty of photo ops, the Space Shuttle Endeavour made a two day circuit of Los Angeles in order to mark its retirement. This was Endeavour’s 26th mission, the previous 25 having all taken place in orbit of the planet, a full 4671 orbits to be precise! During this time, Photographer/cinematographer Matthew Givot and his team followed the shuttle during the 2-day ‘endeavor’ – a drive that included photo-ops of the shuttle driving past several well-known L.A. landmarks – and compiled the footage into a nice 3-minute video (see below).

Showing the many twists and turns that were involved, not to mention stops for photo shoots and the crowds who showed up to pay their respects, the video concludes with Endeavour being brought into her new home, the California Science Center, where she will remain on display for years to come. Here, she joins such historic air and space craft as the A 12 Blackbird, the Apollo-Soyuz command module, Explorer 1, and the Viking Lander. Exhibitions for the Endeavour are reported to begin on October 30th, and are expected to draw some serious crowds!

On a side note, I have to admit that I feel bad for neglecting to mention Endeavour in any of my previous posts. For months now, news has been coming in about its final mission, but I was so caught up in my own story work and posts about cybernetics and other such stuff that I completely passed over it. I’m hoping this sets things to rights a little, as it would be a travesty if I didn’t acknowledge the retirement of this veteran spacecraft and all its accomplished over the years. Not to mention all the astronauts its delivered home, safe and sound. Good work, Endeavour! Enjoy the retirement, you’ve earned it!

Source: Universe Today, California Science Center

Also, if you want to see more of Endeavour’s cross-LA drive, Robert Pearlman has a gallery of over 150 images at collectSPACE.com, and NASA’s Flickr page has a huge collection, too.