Mission: STS-126, 27th station flight (ULF2)
Orbiter: Endeavour (OV-105)
Mission Number: Shuttle flight No. 125
Launch Date: Nov 14, 2008, 19:55 EST/00:55 UT
Launch Pad: 39A map  weather
Docking: Nov 16, 17:01 EST/22:01 UT
Mission Elapsed Time: 15 days, 20 hrs, 30 mins, 34 secs
[Chamitoff spent 183 days in space, 179 aboard the ISS, where Magnus remains]
EVAs: 4
Landing Site: Edwards Air Force Base, California
Landing: November 30, 2008:
main landing gear touchdown: 15:25:06 CST
nose gear: 15:25:21 CST
wheels stop: 15:26:03
Distance Traveled: 6,615,109 miles
Inclination/Altitude: 51.6 degrees/122 nautical miles
Primary Payload: Leonardo Multi-Purpose Logistics Module (MPLM)
Crew: Mission Commander: Christopher J. Ferguson; Pilot: Eric A. Boe; Mission Specialists: Stephen G. Bowen, Donald R. Petit, Robert S. Kimbrough, Heidemarie M. Stefanyshyn-Piper, launch: Sandra H. Magnus (Flight Engineer, NASA science officer, Expedition 17, 18), landing: Gregory Chamitoff (Expedition 17 Flight Engineer) Crew portrait
Contingency Shuttle Crew Support Mission: STS-319 (Rescue STS-126) - Discovery (OV-103).
Video: Windows Media Player .wmv format
STS-126 launches 2.07 MB
STS-126 ready for launch on Pad 39A 1.57 MB
Crew walks out to Astrovan 2.36 MB

8 a.m. CST Thursday, Nov. 27, 2008
Mission Control Center, Houston, Texas

STS-126 Mission Control Center Status Report #26

After Thanksgiving dinner with their hosts on the International Space Station, the seven members of the space shuttle Endeavour crew will board their spacecraft, close its hatches and make final preparations for Friday's undocking.

Endeavour crew members, Commander Chris Ferguson, Pilot Eric Boe and Mission Specialists Don Pettit, Steve Bowen, Heidemarie Stefanyshyn-Piper, Shane Kimbrough and Greg Chamitoff, were awakened at 6 a.m. CST. The song was 'Hold On Tight' by the Electric Light Orchestra. It was for Piper.

The crews will have most of their morning off. After the free time shuttle crew members will talk with representatives of Space.com, KYW-TV in Philadelphia and KOIN-TV in Portland, Ore.

Then they'll share the Thanksgiving meal with Expedition 18 Commander Mike Fincke and Flight Engineers Yury Lonchakov and Sandra Magnus. On the menu are smoked turkey, cornbread dressing, green beans and mushrooms, candied yams and cranapple dessert.

Nov 27: The astronaut class of 1996 was able to have its own mini-reunion with three members of that group sharing home improvement and other duties aboard the International Space Station over the last two weeks. From left, astronauts Donald Pettit, Heide Stefanyshyn-Piper and Michael Fincke pose for a photo on the middeck of Endeavour on the eve of the day the crews of the space shuttle and the orbital outpost's Expedition 18 went separate ways. Fincke, Expedition 18 commander, later stayed behind on the orbital outpost as Stefanyshyn-Piper and Pettit and the rest of the shuttle crew bade farewell with plans of being home on Nov. 30. Credit: NASA

The Multipurpose Logistics Module Leonardo has been loaded with items for return to Earth and is in the shuttle cargo bay. After the last few items are transferred from the station to Endeavour's middeck, Ferguson and Pettit will check out rendezvous tools. A little before 5 p.m., the station and shuttle crew members will say farewell to one another and close hatches between the two vehicles.

Shuttle crewmembers will install the centerline camera that gave them a view of their docking port as they approached the station. It will provide a similar view as they depart.

After leak checks, the shuttle astronauts will begin their scheduled eight-hour sleep period at 8:55 p.m. Their Friday wakeup call at 4:55 a.m. will begin a day that will see undocking from the station at 8:47 a.m., a flyaround of the station beginning about half an hour later, and the shuttle's departure from the area of the station about 11:15 a.m.

The next shuttle status report will be issued at the end of the crew day, or earlier if events warrant.

Nov 27: The aft portion of the Space Shuttle Endeavour, with the multi-purpose logistics module Leonardo in stow mode, was captured in a series of photographs by one of the STS-126 crewmembers on Nov. 27, Thanksgiving day, also the eve of departure from the International Space Station on Nov. 28. Credit: NASA

STS-126 Mission Coverage

- courtesy of NASA