Engineering film footage of the final shuttle launch

Watch the shuttle Atlantis’ backflip, which occurred five years ago today, before docking to the International Space Station.

The tugboat and barge transporting the last space shuttle external tank to its display venue in California have reached the inlet to the Panama Canal, now just days away from sailing into the Pacific.

Thirty years ago Friday, the Hubble Space Telescope was launched aboard the shuttle Discovery with a famously flawed mirror, the opening chapter in an improbable saga of redemption and scientific discovery that revolutionized humanity’s view of the cosmos with jaw-dropping images now familiar to millions.