Space shuttle Atlantis rolls out and is hoisted up for it and the space shuttles final mission, ending over 3 decades of manned flights with the space shuttle. This was by far one of the most incredible things I’ve witnessed in my life. I’ve gotten to use the jaws of life with airport fire rescue, flew a plane, traveled through Asia, but hands down, watching Shuttle Atlantis being prepared is one of the moments I’ll vividly remember for the rest of my life. Below are two different galleries, the first is Atlantis being moved from the Shuttle Processing Facility to the Vehicle Assembly Building. The second gallery is of shuttle Atlantis being hoisted off of the space shuttle carrier and up-righting it to a vertical position and then later mating it to the solid rocket boosters (SRB) and external fuel tank. Being inside of the actual VAB was mind blowing. It’s such an immense structure that makes determining scale difficult. I was able to shoot straight down from about 230ft and people literally do look like ants from such high up and the scale of everything in the VAB.
[svgallery name=”sts135rollout”]
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[svgallery name=”sts135lift”]