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Space Shuttle Endeavour Hoisted for Installation in Vertical Display at LA Museum

Space Shuttle Endeavour is lifted at the California Science Center, where it will be paired with its iconic orange external fuel tank and two solid rocket boosters inside the soon-to-be-completed Samuel Oschin Air and Space Center, in Los Angeles, California, US January 29, 2024. REUTERS/Mike Blake
Space Shuttle Endeavour is lifted at the California Science Center, where it will be paired with its iconic orange external fuel tank and two solid rocket boosters inside the soon-to-be-completed Samuel Oschin Air and Space Center, in Los Angeles, California, US January 29, 2024. REUTERS/Mike Blake
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Space Shuttle Endeavour Hoisted for Installation in Vertical Display at LA Museum

Space Shuttle Endeavour is lifted at the California Science Center, where it will be paired with its iconic orange external fuel tank and two solid rocket boosters inside the soon-to-be-completed Samuel Oschin Air and Space Center, in Los Angeles, California, US January 29, 2024. REUTERS/Mike Blake
Space Shuttle Endeavour is lifted at the California Science Center, where it will be paired with its iconic orange external fuel tank and two solid rocket boosters inside the soon-to-be-completed Samuel Oschin Air and Space Center, in Los Angeles, California, US January 29, 2024. REUTERS/Mike Blake

NASA's retired Space Shuttle Endeavour was carefully hoisted late Monday to be mated to a huge external fuel tank and its two solid rocket boosters at a Los Angeles museum where it will be uniquely displayed as if it is about to blast off.
A massive crane delicately began lifting the orbiter, which is 122 feet (37 meters) long and has a 78-foot (24-meter) wingspan, into the partially built Samuel Oschin Air and Space Center at the California Science Center in Exposition Park, The Associated Press reported.
The building will be completed around Endeavour before the display opens to the public.
The 20-story-tall display stands atop an 1,800-ton (1,633-metric ton) concrete slab supported by six so-called base isolators to protect Endeavour from earthquakes.
All parts of the vertical launch configuration are authentic components of the shuttle system, including the rust-colored external tank, which was flight-qualified.
Endeavour flew 25 missions between 1992 and 2011, when NASA’s shuttle program ended.
The shuttle was flown to Los Angeles International Airport in 2012 atop a NASA Boeing 747 and then created a spectacle as it was inched through tight city streets to Exposition Park. The external tank arrived by barge and made a similar trip across the city.
The shuttle was initially displayed horizontally in a temporary exhibit hall. A groundbreaking ceremony for the Air and Space Center was held in 2022 on the 11th anniversary of Endeavour’s final return from space.
The process of assembling the shuttle system in vertical configuration was dubbed “Go for Stack,” an informal term for putting together rocket components for launch.
It began in July with precise installation of the bottom segments of the side boosters, known as aft skirts, for the first time outside of a NASA facility. In use, the boosters would be attached to the external tank to help the shuttle's main engines lift off.
The 116-foot-long (35.3-meter-long) rocket motors were trucked to Los Angeles from the Mojave Desert in October and were installed the following month.
In all, NASA operated five shuttles in space. Shuttle Challenger and its crew were lost in a launch accident Jan. 28, 1986. Columbia and its crew were lost during return from orbit Feb. 1, 2003. Retired shuttles Atlantis and Discovery and the test ship Enterprise, which did not go to space, are on display across the country.
Atlantis is at Kennedy Space Center, Florida, where it is displayed as if in orbit with its payload doors open and robotic arm extended. Discovery rests on its landing gear at the National Air and Space Museum's Steven F. Udvar-Hazy Center in Chantilly, Virginia.
Enterprise, which was released from a carrier aircraft for approach and landing tests, is displayed at the Intrepid Museum in New York.

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Storm Dumps Record Rain in Northern California, While US Northeast Deals with Winter Storms

A pedestrian walks along a flooded street during a storm Thursday, Nov. 21, 2024, in Santa Rosa, Calif. (AP Photo/Jeff Chiu)
A pedestrian walks along a flooded street during a storm Thursday, Nov. 21, 2024, in Santa Rosa, Calif. (AP Photo/Jeff Chiu)
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Storm Dumps Record Rain in Northern California, While US Northeast Deals with Winter Storms

A pedestrian walks along a flooded street during a storm Thursday, Nov. 21, 2024, in Santa Rosa, Calif. (AP Photo/Jeff Chiu)
A pedestrian walks along a flooded street during a storm Thursday, Nov. 21, 2024, in Santa Rosa, Calif. (AP Photo/Jeff Chiu)

A major storm dropped more snow and record rain in California, causing small landslides and flooding some streets, while on the opposite side of the country blizzard or winter storm warnings were in effect Saturday for areas spanning from the Northeast to central Appalachia.
The storm on the West Coast arrived in the Pacific Northwest earlier this week, killing two people and knocking out power to hundreds of thousands, mostly in the Seattle area, before its strong winds moved through Northern California, The Associated Press reported.
Santa Rosa, California, saw its wettest three-day period on record with about 12.5 inches (32 centimeters) of rain falling by Friday evening, according to the National Weather Service in the Bay Area.
Flooding closed part of scenic Highway 1, also known as the Pacific Coast Highway, in Mendocino County and there was no estimate for when it would reopen, according to the California Department of Transportation.
On the East Coast, another storm brought much-needed rain to New York and New Jersey, where rare wildfires have raged in recent weeks, and heavy snow to northeastern Pennsylvania. Parts of West Virginia were under a blizzard warning through Saturday morning, with up to 2 feet (61 centimeters) of snow and high winds making travel treacherous.
As residents in the Seattle area headed into the weekend, more than 112,000 people were still without power from this season’s strongest atmospheric river — a long plume of moisture that forms over an ocean and flows through the sky over land. Crews worked to clear streets of downed lines, branches and other debris, while cities opened warming centers so people heading into their fourth day without power could get warm food and plug in their cellphones and other devices.
Gale warnings were issued off Washington, Oregon and California, and high wind warnings were in effect across parts of Northern California and Oregon. There were winter storm warnings for parts of the California Cascades and the Sierra Nevada.
Forecasters predicted that both coasts would begin to see a reprieve from the storms as the system in the northeast moves into eastern Canada and the one in the West heads south.
By Friday night, some relief was already being seen in California, where the sheriff’s office in Humboldt County downgraded evacuation orders to warnings for people near the Eel River after forecasters said the waterway would see moderate but not major flooding.
The system roared ashore on the West Coast on Tuesday as a “ bomb cyclone,” which occurs when a cyclone intensifies rapidly. It unleashed fierce winds that toppled trees onto roads, vehicles and homes.
Debra Campbell said she was sitting in the dark with a flashlight that night, unable to sleep as strong winds lashed her house in Crescent City, California. With a massive boom, a 150-foot (46-meter) tree came crashing down on her home and car.
“It was just so incredibly frightening,” AP quoted Campbell as saying. “Once I realized it wasn’t going to come through the ceiling where I was at, I was able to grab my car keys and my purse. ... And I open the front door and it’s just solid tree.”
In the Northeast, which has been hit by drought, more than 2 inches (5 centimeters) of rain was expected by Saturday morning north of New York City, with snow mixed in at higher elevations.
Despite the mess, the precipitation was expected to help ease drought conditions in a state that has seen an exceptionally dry fall.
“It’s not going to be a drought buster, but it’s definitely going to help when all this melts,” said Bryan Greenblatt, a National Weather Service meteorologist in Binghamton, New York.
Heavy snow fell in northeastern Pennsylvania, including the Pocono Mountains, prompting a raft of school closures. Higher elevations reported up to 17 inches (43 centimeters), with lesser accumulations in valley cities like Scranton and Wilkes-Barre. More than 85,000 customers in 10 counties lost power, and the state transportation department imposed speed restrictions on some highways.