Orbiter technicians monitor the progress as space shuttle Discovery's fuel cells are drained of all fluids.

Inside Orbiter Processing Facility-1 at NASA’s Kennedy Space Center in Florida, technicians monitor the progress as space shuttle Discovery’s fuel cells are drained of all fluids.

After all of the coolant is removed, the fuel cells will be returned to their previous location within Discovery’s mid-body. The hydrogen and oxygen dewars which feed reactants to the fuel cells remain in Discovery’s mid-body and have been purged with inert gases and vented down. The work is part of the Space Shuttle Program’s transition and retirement processing of shuttle Discovery. Discovery is being prepared for display at the Smithsonian’s National Air and Space Museum, Steven F. Udvar-Hazy Center in Chantilly, Va. For more information, visit http://www.nasa.gov/shuttle. Photo credit: NASA/Frankie Martin