The Space Shuttle Discovery is loaded and ready for her final flight, this time rather than  attached to a giant rocket aimed towards the Heavens, it is attached to a modified Boeing 747 jet that will leave NASA's Kennedy Space Center in Cape Canaveral en route for Dulles International Airport, to deliver the historic craft to the Smithsonian Institution.

Discovery returned from its final space mission in March of last year, and NASA retired the entire space shuttle program for good shortly after. With 39 spaceflights under its belt, totaling about 365 total days in space, Discovery was NASA's workhorse during the 30-year shuttle program.

Before landing, the piggybacked shuttle will fly low over the nations capitol giving residents of Washington D.C. a rare sight before she is permanently parked in a hanger at the Steven F. Udvar-Hazy Center, part of Smithsonian's National Air and Space Museum.

I have fond memories of the shuttle program and think it is one of the most amazing accomplishments in American history and I can't wait to take my daughter there someday and show her this piece of history. I hope America can do something important and impressive like this again someday, RIP Discovery.

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