Crew Loads Up Litter for Shuttle Trip Home

The departing international space station crew loaded more than 2 tons of dirty laundry, empty food trays, packing foam and equipment into a cargo carrier and placed it aboard space shuttle Endeavour for the trip home.

Endeavour is to undock from the space station today, ending an eight-day visit. Before it leaves, though, it may have to steer the orbiting complex out of the way of a piece of space junk.

NASA was worried that a piece of an old Russian rocket might come close to the space station. Endeavour’s pilots may have to fire the shuttle’s thrusters to move the station out of harm’s way.