U.S. shuttle Discovery lands safely at Kennedy Space Center

2009-03-28 19:12:39 GMT2009-03-29 03:12:39 (Beijing Time) Xinhua English

The space shuttle Discovery has its drag parachute deployed as it rolls past the runway convoy after it returned to earth at the Kennedy Space Center in Cape Canaveral, Florida March 28, 2009. The landing ends Mission STS-119 to the International Space Station. (Reuters Photo)

WASHINGTON, March 28 (Xinhua) -- The U.S. space shuttle Discovery touched down on Saturday at Kennedy Space Center in Florida, ending its 13-day mission to the International Space Station.

Discovery, with seven astronauts aboard, landed at 3:14 p.m. EDT (1914 GMT) at Kennedy, the space shuttle's home port, NASA TV showed.

The space ship scrapped its first touchdown opportunity, scheduled for 1:39 p.m. EDT (1739 GMT) on Saturday, due to cloudy and windy weather.

Discovery blasted off to the space on March 15. During its eight-day stay with the space station, astronauts performed three spacewalks to install the S6 truss segment to the starboard, or right side of the station, and deploy its fourth and final set of solar array wings.

Discovery brought back five months' worth of experiments from the space station, mostly blood, urine and saliva collected by its crew members.

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