"NASA's Discovery: 40 Years of Space Shuttle Excellence"

NASA celebrates the 40th anniversary of Space Shuttle Discovery, the longest-serving Space Shuttle. Discovery flew 39 missions over more than 26 years, including launching the Hubble Space Telescope and participating in the International Space Station assembly. It was also the first to carry a cosmonaut on a US spacecraft and ferried veteran astronaut John Glenn to orbit. Despite experiencing launch abort and being used for Return To Flight missions after the Challenger and Columbia disasters, Discovery was retired in 2011 and is now on public display at the Steven F. Udvar-Hazy Center in Virginia.