Shuttle leaves orbit for California landing

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By Irene Klotz

CAPE CANAVERAL, Florida (Reuters) - The space shuttle Endeavour left orbit on Sunday after a marathon mission to prepare the International Space Station for a bigger crew and headed for a touchdown at NASA's backup landing site in California.

Endeavour commander Chris Ferguson and pilot Eric Boe fired their ship's twin braking rockets to leave orbit at 3:19 p.m. (8:19 p.m. British time), beginning an hour-long glide to Edwards Air Force Base in the Mojave Desert. Touchdown was scheduled for 4:25 p.m. EST (9:25 p.m. British time).

NASA had hoped to end its 124th shuttle flight a few miles from where it began 16 days ago at the Kennedy Space Centre in Florida. But rain and high winds socked in the spaceport, prompting flight directors to divert Endeavour and its seven-member crew to California.

The switch means it will be another day before returning space station flight engineer Greg Chamitoff is reunited with his wife and toddler twins, who were awaiting his arrival in Florida. Chamitoff, 46, has been in orbit for six months. He was replaced by rookie astronaut Sandra Magnus, who is scheduled to remain aboard the station until February.

NASA prefers to land in Florida to save about a week and almost $2 million to ferry the shuttle cross-country.

Endeavour is returning from a home-improvement mission at the $100 billion space station, a project of 16 nations. The crew installed a water recycling system that will enable NASA to add three more astronauts to the space station's permanent live-aboard crew.

They also conducted four spacewalks to repair the station's power system and delivered two new bedrooms, a second toilet, exercise gear, a small galley and other equipment.

A Russian cargo ship arrived at the space station early on Sunday with fuel, water and more supplies. Flight engineer Yury Lonchakov remotely guided the Progress vessel to a docking port after its automated system failed.

NASA's next station visit is planned for February when the outpost's last solar wing panel will be installed. The agency plans eight more shuttle flights to the station, as well as a final servicing call to the Hubble Space Telescope, before retiring the shuttles in 2010.

(Editing by Jane Sutton and Cynthia Osterman)

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