(AP)
Thursday, March 27, 2008

CAPE CANAVERAL, Fla.—The U.S. space shuttle Endeavour and its crew of seven returned to Earth yesterday, making a rare nighttime touchdown to wrap up “a two-week adventure” at the international space station.
The shuttle swooped through the darkness and landed on NASA’s illuminated runway at 8:39 p.m. (ET), an hour after sunset.

“Welcome home, Endeavour,” Mission Control radioed. “Congrats to the entire crew.”
Endeavour’s commander, Dominic Gorie, replied: “It was a super-rewarding mission, exciting from the start to the ending.”
The shuttle’s homecoming was a bit delayed.
Endeavour was supposed to land before sunset but at virtually the last minute, clouds moved in.
As the astronauts took an extra swing around the planet, the sky cleared enough to satisfy flight controllers and—after asking Gorie for his opinion—they gave him the green light to head home.
It was only the 22nd space shuttle landing in darkness. Fewer than one-fifth of all missions have ended at nighttime; the last one was in 2006.
Endeavour blasted off March 11—also in darkness—on an ambitious, intense space station construction mission that had even its commander wondering at times how everything would go.
In the end, Gorie and his multinational crew accomplished everything they set out to do during their voyage, which spanned 16 days and 10 million km.