QUICK FACTS
Where is it? Over the Bahamas
What’s in the photo? The space shuttle Atlantis, preparing to dock with the International Space Station (ISS)
Who took the photo? An unnamed astronaut on board the ISS
When was it taken? July 10, 2011
This stunning astronaut photo shows the last time one of NASA‘s iconic space shuttles photobombed astronauts’ view of Earth as the spacecraft docked with the ISS.
NASA’s Space Shuttle Program included five plane-like spacecraft — Columbia, Challenger, Discovery, Atlantis and Endeavour — which collectively completed 135 missions between 1981 and 2011, racking up more than 32,000 hours in space. During that time, they helped to construct the ISS and, later, ferry astronauts to and from the station. The space shuttles also helped to deploy and maintain several other important spacecraft, including the Hubble Space Telescope.
The last space shuttle to fly was Atlantis, which successfully completed 33 missions (the second-highest total, behind Discovery).
This photo shows Atlantis approaching the ISS for the last time as it passed over the distinctive turquoise waters of the Bahamas. The space shuttle’s bay doors are open, exposing its cargo area. This was standard procedure for all space shuttles once they reached low Earth orbit because it prevented the spacecraft’s radiators from overheating.
The open doors also enabled the shuttle’s docking mechanism, located within its cargo bay, to attach to the ISS, thus creating a pressurized seal so that astronauts could move between the two spacecraft.
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Atlantis’ final flight began on July 8, 2011, when it launched from the Kennedy Space Center in Florida vertically strapped to a massive fuel tank and a pair of rocket boosters. It returned to Earth on July 21, gliding down to land onto a runway at the launch site. (The spacecraft is now on display at the Kennedy Space Center Visitor Complex.)
In addition to helping construct the ISS, NASA’s space shuttles visited Russia’s Mir space station, serviced Hubble, and deployed both the Magellan probe to Venus and the Galileo probe to Jupiter. In total, the space shuttle orbited Earth 4,848 times, traveling nearly 126 million miles (203 million kilometers) — more than 525 times the distance between Earth and the moon.
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Astronaut photos of the space shuttles were popular because they offered “punctuated snapshots of distinct places on Earth” that were “framed by a human eye,” NASA representatives wrote in 2011. “These images speak to people.”
Atlantis touched down at the Kennedy Space Center on July 21, 2011, brining the 30-year Space Shuttle program to an end.
(Image credit: NASA/Bill Ingalls)
While the Space Shuttle Program achieved a lot during its 30-year history, it famously suffered two tragedies: the 1986 Challenger and 2003 Columbia disasters, which killed all crewmembers on board.
NASA eventually canceled the program in 2011, citing the high cost of maintaining the aging spacecraft and a reduced need for the vehicles after the completion of the ISS the same year. To this day, the space shuttles remain the only winged spacecraft to carry humans into space.