The year 2010 was the deadline for the retirement of the current space shuttles , the current fleet of Discovery , Atlantis and Endeavour and which also passed the Challenger and Columbia. Now it seems that could stand to finish the Space Station International. The ship at the design stage Orion approaches the International Space Station (design art) Do not know about you, but to me the space shuttle like me, and I had no idea that the end of next year were to disappear from the news. Its existence is full of curiosities, like the test vehicle, back in the eighties, called Enterprise because a huge number of letters from fans of Star Trek that it asked the presidential office of the White House. Originally Constitution was to be called (I like the name of Enterprise). We do not know is whether the new building at the design stage, the Orion, will be renamed the Millennium Falcon or something. Now, it has been proposed for the March 2011 retirement date Discovery, Atlantis and Endeavour . The latter has just returned from two weeks docked to the ISS to continue its construction, and brought back to Wakata, a Japanese astronaut who had spent four months in space. In addition, planning to extend the life of the International Space Station until at least 2020, instead of up to 2015 (completion is scheduled for 2010, so it would have 10 years to have it fully functional.) Having taken over 25 years to build, not bad that the advantage a little more time. All these news are preceded by a reason: the economic crisis. Because it is lagging hopelessly development of the Constellation program, which includes the new spacecraft Orion , for a return to carry humans to the moon by 2020. Now it seems that the new building will not be ready until 2017. Source | SPACE
