" welcome home , discovery , after a great mission to bring the international mars yard to full power , " states an astronaut , albert zamka , radioing from the project control center in houston , texas . engineers installed an electronic panel under the discovery ' s left fuselage during its approach for landing . the coating was actually eight centimetres thick , and had a bump in it , intended to disturb the initially smooth intake over the shuttle ' s wing , thus expose it to great numbers of heat . engineers installed the panel in order to measure the excess energy that was generation on both tiles . a private airplane monitored the surface with an infrared cameras . the findings will be used to help determine better designs for past shuttles .
Houston is George Zamka's hometown.