The Space Shuttle Discovery sits atop one of NASA's modified Boeing 747 Shuttle Carrier Aircraft as the unusual piggyback duo is towed along a taxiway at NASA's Dryden Flight Research Center at Edwards, California. The Discovery was ferried from NASA Dryden to NASA's Kennedy Space Center in Florida on November 2, 2000, after extensive pre-ferry servicing and preparations. STS-92 was the 100th mission since the fleet of four Space Shuttles began flying in 1981. (Due to schedule changes, missions are not always launched in the order that was originally planned.) The almost 13-day mission, the 46th Shuttle mission to land at Edwards, was the last construction mission for the International Space Station prior to the first scientists taking up residency in the orbiting space laboratory the following month. The seven-member crew on STS-92 included mission specialists Koichi Wakata, Michael Lopez-Alegria, Jeff Wisoff, Bill McArthur and Leroy Chiao, pilot Pam Melroy and mission commander Brian Duffy.
