The Space Shuttle Endeavour Goes On Public Display Later This Year

The California Science Center has announced that Endeavour, NASA’s final space shuttle, will go on permanent display at the Samuel Oschin Air and Space Center on November 13, 2026. The new 200,000 square-foot addition to the science museum that will house the shuttle alongside a collection of 100 artifacts, including a selection of “rare and historic aerospace objects.”

Endeavour has technically been on display horizontally at the California Science Center since 2012, but this new exhibit will showcase the shuttle in launch position, complete with Endeavour’s solid boosters and external tank. Besides viewing the shuttle in all its glory, museum guests will be able to ascend an 140-foot gantry elevator next to the shuttle, simulating the experience astronauts have right before they board and launch.

NASA originally created the Space Shuttle Endeavour as a replacement shuttle following the Challenger disaster in 1986. Starting in 1992, Endeavour was used in multiple missions, repairing and deploying satellites, servicing the Hubble Space Telescope and ferrying astronauts to the International Space Station. The shuttle was formally retired in 2011, and NASA announced it would spend its permanent retirement in Los Angeles in 2012. That same year, the shuttle made a slow, and perilous 12-mile land trip from the Los Angeles International Airport to the California Science Center, where it’s been housed to this day.