Shuttle Endeavour returns after record-setting mission to ISS

0 Comments | AFP, March, 2008

CAPE CANAVERAL, Florida (AFP) — Space shuttle Endeavour and its crew are home after carrying Japan's maiden space laboratory and a Canadian repair robot to the International Space Station on a record-setting mission.

Endeavour landed at the Kennedy Space Center at 8:39 pm Wednesday (0039 GMT Thursday) after a 16-day mission that included a record 12-day docking at the ISS and five spacewalks -- the most ever embarked upon in a single mission.

The shuttle and its seven astronauts touched down 90 minutes later than scheduled after an initial landing was postponed due to poor weather.

It was the second nighttime landing since September 2006 and the 29th since the first shuttle launch in 1981.

"Welcome Endeavour," NASA's Jim Dutton at mission control...