WEBVTT

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George Diller/Shuttle Ground Operations Commentator: And the commander is now

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leaving the crew transport vehicle along with our other astronauts,

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being greeted by our NASA administrator and our Center Director Bob Cabana.

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We see Sandy Magnus, Doug Hurley, Rex Walheim and Chris Ferguson.

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There's the Atlantis banner that was actually on the hatch of Atlantis

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when the hatch was closed.

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And now we're underneath Atlantis.

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Going to be going over to the landing gear and looking at the tiles with the remainder of

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the crew.

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There's our administrator, Charlie Bolden again, Pilot Doug Hurley, Sandy Magnus.

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Bob Cabana is talking with our commander, Chris Ferguson.

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Bob Cabana also has served as an astronaut on the space shuttle.

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Rex Walheim, and we see our purge equipment in the background that hooks up to the aft

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of Atlantis, providing all the cooling right now. Atlantis' onboard cooling systems are off.

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NASA Administrator Charles Bolden: They have come to be known as the

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'Final Four' and they did an absolutely incredible job.

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If you had an opportunity to watch anytime during the mission,

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they were like racehorses the whole time. So they made us very proud.

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You know, we've been exploring since early in our country's history.

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And what Fergie and his crew did this time was kind of close out this era of our

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exploration. But I want everybody who was involved in this to feel incredibly proud of

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what you did, and what your role was.

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Like me, they got an opportunity to do the flying, but we owe an incredible debt of

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gratitude to the thousands -- literally tens of thousands, if not hundreds of thousands -- of

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folks around the country who made all this possible. I had a chance to talk to some of you

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this morning and, you know, we were lining up the convoy.

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I thank you again for everything that you've done.

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The things that we've done have set us up for exploration of the future,

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but I don't want to talk about that right now. I just want to salute this crew,

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welcome them home, let them know how proud we are of them. And Fergie,

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I ask you to come on up and talk for your crew here.

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(Applause)

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STS-135 Commander Chris Ferguson: Thank you Charlie, we really appreciate those

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remarks. I'll tell you what, you know, flying in space is a real dream.

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But flying in space has a lot more to do with who you do it with than what you do.

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And these three folks -- Rex and Sandy and Doug -- I'll tell you, a commander couldn't

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ask for three better people to go and perform an aggressive and, to a certain extent,

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historic mission. I mean, there's no doubt that there was a lot of attention paid to this

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mission because it does bring to a final close the 30 years of space shuttle history.

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I'm going to speak on behalf of them and just say that we're all, the three of us,

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or four of us, were honored to be a part of this. But ultimately, it's everyone who has

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worked on the shuttle program. Although we got to take the ride, we sure hope that

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everybody who has ever worked, or touched, or looked at, or envied, or admired a space

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shuttle was able to take just a little part of the journey with us.

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We're going to put Atlantis in a museum now, along with the other three orbiters,

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for generations that will come after us to admire and appreciate.

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And hopefully, I want that picture of a young, six-year-old boy looking up at a space

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shuttle in a museum and say, Daddy, I want to do something like that when I grow up.

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Or, I want our country to do fantastic things like this for the continued future.

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And if we set those steps right now, and they continue with that next generation of space

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explorers, then I consider our job here complete. So again, on behalf of the crew,

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thank you so much for the time and the attention. And for the folks at KSC,

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thank you for this fantastic vehicle. It performed absolutely wonderfully.

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Not a glitch. And it's just as pristine as it was, I hope, on the day that we took it ?

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barring, maybe, a door to the WCS, which opened up a little bit on entry. (Laughing)

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But everything is wonderful, the vehicle is great, and thank you very much.

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(Applause)

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