More than a decade ago, the last space shuttle mission (STS-135) dropped out of the predawn darkness and landed on Runway 15 at the Shuttle Landing Facility at NASA’s Kennedy Space Center for the final time.
Over the course of the more than eight days, Commander Chris Ferguson, Pilot Doug Hurley, and Mission Specialists Sandy Magnus and Rex Walheim had spent much of their time delivering a stockpile of supplies and parts to the International Space Station.
The end of their mission aboard Atlantis may have been the end of the space shuttle era, but it was the beginning of a new stage of exploration.