Story Continues Below"Houston, Discovery, wheels stopped," shuttle commander Rick Sturckow called to mission control in Houston as the orbiter gently rolled to a stop on runway 22 at the legendary air and spacecraft test facility.

"Copy, wheels stopped," astronaut CAPCOM Eric Boe replied. "Welcome home, Discovery. Congratulations on an extremely successful mission, stepping up science to a new level on the International Space Station."

Discovery's touchdown occurred at 8:53:25 p.m. EDT after a flight of 13 days, 20 hours, 53 minuts and 45 seconds after 219 orbits and 5.7 million miles in space.

The shuttle rocketed into space from Kennedy Space Center at 11:59:37 p.m. EDT on August 28.

Discovery undocked from the International Space Station last Tuesday in anticipation for landing at Kennedy Space Center planned for yesterday. However, persistent unstable weather at the Florida site forced waveoffs of both landing opportunities and left the shuttle in orbit an extra day.

Today's weather was similarly dynamic, and Flight Director Richard Jones passed on both Kennedy opportunities and directing Sturckow and pilot Kevin Ford to target a California homecoming instead.

Sturckow and Ford fired the shuttle's twin Orbital Maneuvering System engines at 7:47:37 p.m. EDT to begin the re-entry and descent to Edwards.

Accompanying Sturckow and Ford were mission specialists Danny Olivas, Patrick Forrester, Jose Hernandez, European astronaut Christer Fuglesang and returning space station Flight Engineer Timothy Kopra, completing a 58 day space flight.

Discovery glided through partly cloudy skies over California, the early evening Sun glinting off its sleek heat shield as Sturckow steered the winged spaceplane through a wide 213 degree turn over the landing site to bleed off excess energy before lining up on the glidepath for a tire-scorching touchdown on the centerline of Runway 22.

An hour and a half after landing, Discovery's crew members, minus Kopra, stepped out of the crew transport vehicle for the traditional postlanding walkaround and inspection of the orbiter before Sturckow made brief comments on camera.

"We're very happy to be back on land here in California," Sturckow said. "We wish we could have gone to Florida today, gotten to see our families down there, but it just didn't work out with the weather."

As is standard procedure for returning space station crewmembers, Kopra was subjected to postflight medical testing that prevented him from walking off Discovery. Instead, he rode back to crew quarters lying down in the crew transport vehicle.

STS-128 marks the last time the space shuttle will be used to rotate Expedition members to and from the space station as NASA focuses resources on completing assembly of ISS and packing it with as many spare parts and equipment as possible before the shuttle fleet is retired after just six more missions over the next year.

STS-128 delivered two new science racks, one for materials science experiments and one for fluid physics, a freezer for preserving experiment samples, a new crew sleep station and a new air revitalization system.

During the flight, spacewalking astronauts replcaed a nearly depleted ammonia coolant tank on the outside of the station's main truss. The 1,800 pound tank is about 70% empty. During a carefully choreographed EVA, the spent tank wwas be replaced with a fresh unit from Discovery's payload bay.

Another payload aboard the shuttle was a new exercise treadmill, named after comedian Stephen Colbert, the Combined Operational Load-Bearing External Resistance Treadmill, or C.O.L.B.E.R.T.

During a NASA contest to name a new station module, Node 3, Colbert urged viewers to write in his name instead of choosing one of the choices suggested by the space agency. Although his name won, NASA officials refused to name the module after him (a potential violation of NASA policy anyway) and named the module Tranquility. Instead, they named the new treadmill after the comedian.

In all, Discovery delivered science equipment and racks to the station totaling 6,050 pounds, as well as 1,590 of supplies such as food, water and clothes for the crew. The shuttle also hauled 6,190 pounds of spare parts and equipment that will be used to maintain the station in the future.

(The Spacearium / Space Media Corporation)