On April 28 – 30, 2014 Palletized Trucking transported NASA’s retired Shuttle Carrier Aircraft (SCA), a modified Boeing 747 dubbed NASA 905, from Ellington Field to its new home at Space Center Houston. Although the actual move of the SCA took only two nights, months of preparation and strategic planning went into readying the city of Houston for the job. The jumbo-jet was disassembled into seven large pieces and loaded onto transport vehicles, creating a 920-foot convoy.

NASA 905 was the main shuttle carrier for NASA’s space shuttle program and has ferried all five of NASA’s orbiters – Columbia, Challenger, Discovery, Atlantis, and Endeavour. At Space Center Houston, the jet is being reassembled and rejoined with space shuttle orbiter mock-up, Independence, better known as “Explorer” when it was on display at the Kennedy Space Center Visitor Complex until moving to Houston in 2012. Together with the Shuttle Carrier Aircraft, the display will stand 8 stories tall. The site is expected to open in 2015 just outside NASA’s Johnson Space Center.