Space shuttle Endeavour was lifted onto the Shuttle Carrier Aircraft this afternoon for her upcoming ride from Florida to California… the last time any of the surviving shuttles are likely going to be moved in this fashion. The last time we’ll ever see this ungainly piggyback configuration. I find myself wondering what’s going to become of the two SCAs. It seems to me that at least one of them ought to be preserved as well — as far as I know, they are unique in aerospace history; I don’t know of any other aircraft that have carried another craft of nearly equal size on its back like this — but I haven’t heard if there any such plans.

Speaking of plans, Endeavour‘s new home, the California Science Center is Los Angeles, has extremely ambitious ones for displaying its new acquisition. The Center intends to mount Endeavour as if she were on the launch pad, standing vertically, attached to a pair of empty solid-rocket boosters and an external fuel tank that will be supplied by NASA at a later date. In other words, the CSC, unlike all the other museums that simply have an orbiter sitting in a hanger, wants to display a complete shuttle stack. And I thought Kennedy Space Center’s “in-flight” display plans sounded cool! I have no idea how soon this vision might come to reality (assuming it ever does), but I hope it happens soon.

The youngest of the space shuttles is scheduled to depart from Kennedy on Monday, September 17, and take three days transiting the country (she’ll be overflying seven states and eight NASA facilities, essentially making a farewell tour). Endeavour will land at LAX and spend a couple weeks getting ready for her “road trip,” then be placed on an oversized flat-bed trailer and towed 12 miles along LA city streets in what’s being called “the mother of all parades,” finally reaching her new home in Exposition Park on October 13. The public will be able to call on her beginning October 30.

Photo credit: NASA Kennedy Space Center’s Twitter feed.