Workers begin hanging the parachutes recovered after the launch of Endeavour on the STS-126 mission onto a monorail system.

At the Parachute Refurbishment Facility at NASA's Kennedy Space Center in Florida, workers begin hanging the parachutes recovered from sea after the launch of space shuttle Endeavour on the STS-126 mission onto a monorail system. The parachutes are used to slow the descent of the solid rocket boosters that are jettisoned during liftoff. The monorail will transport each parachute into a 30,000-gallon washer and a huge dryer heated with 140-degree air at 13,000 cubic feet per minute One pilot, one drogue and three main canopies per booster slow the booster’s fall from about 360 mph to 50 mph. After the chutes are cleaned and repaired, they must be carefully packed into their bags so they will deploy correctly the next time they are used. Photo credit: NASA/Jim Grossmann