Space shuttle on verge of final landing

(AP) -- Perfect weather awaited space shuttle Atlantis on Thursday for the very last landing of the 30-year program.

Atlantis' four astronauts shut the payload bay doors in the wee hours of the morning. That set them on a course toward an on-time touchdown at 5:56 a.m., just before dawn.

Commander Christopher Ferguson told Mission Control that this really was it.

NASA is ending its shuttle program with Atlantis' successful space station resupply mission. It is the 135th flight in shuttle history. This grand finale comes 50 years to the day that Gus Grissom became the second American in space, aboard Liberty Bell 7.

A record crowd of 2,000 was expected at NASA's landing strip to welcome Atlantis home.

It was to be a true homecoming for Atlantis, which first soared in 1985. The next-to-youngest in NASA's fleet will remain at Kennedy Space Center as a museum display.

Atlantis - the last of NASA's three surviving shuttles to retire - performed admirably during the 13-day flight.

It dropped off a full year's worth of food and other supplies at the International Space Station, just in case upcoming deliveries get delayed.

The space station's international partners - Russia, Europe and Japan - will continue to carry up cargo loads. And Russia will keep launching American astronauts to the orbiting lab until private industry is ready to fly people up in three to five years.

Several private companies are vying for the cargo runs and astronaut ferry flights. The front-runner hopes to make its first shipment of supplies by the end of this year.

A U.S. flag that flew on the first shuttle flight in 1981 and returned to orbit aboard Atlantis, is now at the space station. The first company to get astronauts there will claim the flag as a prize.

©2011 The Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed.