Astronauts to Inspect Shuttle Heat Shield for Dings

Endeavour's external fuel tank gracefully falls away from the shuttle, revealing the orbiter's heat shield, during a Nov. 14, 2008 liftoff. (Image credit: NASA TV.)

Astronauts aboard NASA's shuttle

Led by commander

?I?ll be doing a good chunk of the

Boe and mission specialists Shane

The inspection is expected to begin

Orbital inspections of a shuttle?s

Shuttle astronauts now use a suite

?Once all the data gets to the

Astronauts aboard the space station

A final inspection is scheduled near

Endeavour?s STS-126 mission is

"We?re taking a three-bedroom,

The planned 15-day mission will keep

NASA is providing live coverage of

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Jeremy Hsu is science writer based in New York City whose work has appeared in Scientific American, Discovery Magazine, Backchannel, Wired.com and IEEE Spectrum, among others. He joined the Space.com and Live Science teams in 2010 as a Senior Writer and is currently the Editor-in-Chief of Indicate Media. Jeremy studied history and sociology of science at the University of Pennsylvania, and earned a master's degree in journalism from the NYU Science, Health and Environmental Reporting Program. You can find Jeremy's latest project on Twitter.