Preparations are under way to install a Pratt Whitney Rocketdyne space shuttle main engine SSME into a transportation canister.

In the Space Shuttle Main Engine Processing Facility at NASA’s Kennedy Space Center in Florida, preparations are under way to install a Pratt Whitney Rocketdyne space shuttle main engine (SSME) into a transportation canister.

This is the second of the 15 engines used during the Space Shuttle Program to be prepared for transfer to NASA's Stennis Space Center in Mississippi. The engines will be stored at Stennis for future use on NASA's new heavy-lift rocket, the Space Launch System (SLS), which will carry NASA's new Orion spacecraft, cargo, equipment and science experiments to space. For more information, visit http://www.nasa.gov/shuttle. Photo credit: NASA/Gianni Woods