![]() ![]() Some 400 trees had been removed along the route, but officials said most of the trees that gave them trouble could not be cut down because they were old or treasured for other reasons, including some planted in honour of Martin Luther King Jr. But accumulated hurdles and hiccups caused it to run hours behind at day's end. Saturday started off promising, with Endeavour 90 minutes ahead of schedule. The dolly was pulled across the Manchester Boulevard bridge by a Toyota Tundra pickup, and the car company filmed the event for a commercial after paying for a permit, turning the entire scene into a movie set complete with special lighting, sound and staging. Late Friday, crews spent hours transferring the shuttle to a special, lighter towing dolly for its trip over Interstate 405. The cross-town transport was estimated at $10 million, to be paid for by the science centre and private donations. "Not too many people will be able to match that, to say 'we moved the space shuttle through the streets of Inglewood and Los Angeles."' "It's historic and will be a great memory," he said. Organizers had planned a slow trip, saying the spacecraft that once orbited at more than 17,000 mph would move at just 2 mph in its final voyage through Inglewood and southern Los Angeles.īut that estimate turned out to be generous, with Endeavour often creeping along at a barely detectable pace when it wasn't at a dead stop due to difficult-to-manoeuvr obstacles like trees and light posts.Īnother delay came in the early morning hours Sunday when the shuttle's remote-controlled wheel carrier began leaking oil.ĭespite the holdups, the team charged with transporting the shuttle felt a "great sense of accomplishment" when it made it onto the museum grounds, said Jim Hennessy, a spokesman for Sarens, the contract mover. But here it is, and it's a dream come true." "We've waited so long and been told so many things about when it would get here. "It's like Christmas!" said Mark Behn, 55, a member of the museum ground support team who watched the shuttle's snaillike approach from inside the hangar. The Endeavour was still inching toward a hangar on the grounds of the museum mid-Sunday afternoon. LOS ANGELES - It was supposed to be a slow but smooth journey to retirement, a parade through city streets for a shuttle that logged millions of miles in space.īut Endeavour's final mission turned out to be a logistical headache that delayed its arrival to its museum resting place by about 17 hours.Īfter a 12-mile trek through city streets that included thousands of adoring onlookers, flashing cameras and even the filming of a TV commercial, Endeavour arrived at the California Science Center Sunday to a greeting party of city leaders and other dignitaries that had expected it many hours earlier. ![]()
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