MISION STS-132-TRIBUTO AL ATLANTIS

(Music)

George Diller/NASA Public Affairs Officer: Firing chain is armed. Sound suppression water system activated. T minus 10... nine... eight... seven... six... five... four... three... two... one... zero... and liftoff of space shuttle Atlantis on a mission to build, re-supply and to do research on the International Space Station.

Hugh Harris/Former Kennedy Space Center Public Affairs Director: Well, it's always exciting when you're getting a new vehicle. And the space shuttle is really unique. It still is the only spacecraft that's ever been built by people that takes off, goes into orbit and performs a big job up there, and then flies back and lands, and gets ready to go on another mission. So it was a very exciting thing to have a new vehicle like Atlantis to launch.

Craig Covault/Veteran Space Journalist: One mission that not many people are aware of with Atlantis was its third flight, shuttle mission 27. When it launched really a one-of-a-kind, billion-dollar spacecraft for the first time, called LCROSS 1, and it was launched by Atlantis in 1988. After the crew deployed the spacecraft, ground control found there were problems with the satellite and something did not deploy properly. So, mission Commander 'Hoot' Gibson flew Atlantis back to LCROSS 1 and then the crew took action to, we believe, free a stuck antenna of some sort. They saved a billion-dollar secret mission.

Angela Brewer/Atlantis Flow Director: I think the most important one, the one that I've been very proud of, to be a part of, is the Hubble mission that we did on STS-125. Just the science alone from Hubble is amazing. And just to be able to, you know, take all the hardware up and the astronauts up, and be a part of the repair effort and the servicing effort was really amazing.

Michael Good/STS-132 Mission Specialist: Well, it's going to be great to be back on Atlantis. I'm very excited about getting another opportunity to fly on board Atlantis. I flew it on my only other mission up to the Hubble servicing mission. And then now, to be able to get another ride on Atlantis, but up to the space station, it's going to be, it's going to be incredible.

Angela Brewer/Atlantis Flow Director: I'll be excited as I always am. But I, you know, I don't relax until after MECO. You know, it's going to be an emotional day. And I think it's going to be bittersweet.

Michael Good/STS-132 Mission Specialist: It's kind of flying off into the sunset in one respect. But we're still doing, you know, important good work. We're taking up this Russian module that's actually, its name in Russian means 'dawn.' So, in one way we're flying off into the sunset, but we're still, you know, doing important work and it's providing more capability to the space station.

Angela Brewer/Atlantis Flow Director: We love all the shuttles. But when you start working exclusively on one, when you're responsible for one, you kind of grow attached to your shuttle. One of the things that I get to do when the vehicle lands out at Dryden, which it's done a couple times since I've been the flow director, is to, I get to ride on the pathfinder back with the vehicle. And stopping over at all the places that we stopover, we literally stop traffic on roads. I mean, interstates people pull over when they see the shuttle on top of the STA, and just are just in awe. They just cannot get enough of it. And that, to me, you know, when people see it, sometimes it's out-of-sight, out-of-mind, but when they see it, they are just awestruck.

Craig Covault/Veteran Space Journalist: Atlantis leaves a legacy of really being the spaceship that bridged the cold war with the post-cold war era.

Michael Good/STS-132 Mission Specialist: This could be the last flight of Atlantis. And so, we're going to do our best to pay tribute to Atlantis not just for this flight, but for its whole, you know, all the flights that it's been on and all the things that it's done, and all the people that have worked on it.

Hugh Harris/Former Kennedy Space Center Public Affairs Director: You have to say, you know, 'what a magnificent vehicle it has been and what a great job that you've done.'

(Music)