
At 5:15 a.m. EDT 18th may , Endeavour began the nine-minute Rendezvous Pitch
Maneuver, or 'backflip,' on its last visit to the Inernational Space
Station. With Commander Mark Kelly at the controls, Endeavour rotated
360 degrees backward to enable space station astronauts
Dmitry Kondratyev, Paolo Nespoli and Cady Coleman to take high
resolution pictures of the shuttle’s heat shield. Kelly then flew the
shuttle through a quarter circle to a position about 400 feet directly
in front of the station. Docking occurred about an hour later at 6:14
a.m.