On July 28, 2005 while on the STS-114 mission, the United States Space Shuttle Discovery performed a "flip" manoeuver just before docking to the International Space Station (ISS). The main goal was for the astronauts aboard the ISS to take detailed pictures of the Shuttle's thermal protection system to be able to verify its integrity. At that time, the ISS and the Shuttle were 200 m apart and both moving at approximately 7.6 km/s (27'000 km/hour). This manoeuvre took place just above Switzerland at an altitude of 353 km. There was little to no cloud coverage, which allowed to take these stunning images.

Courtesy of NASA with thanks to Claude Nicollier for forwarding the originals to the Space Center EPFL.

	Lake of Geneva, Lausanne, Yverdon-les-Bains and the French Jura Desktop size (250 KB) 1280x1024 optimized for your screen Full size with info (933 KB) 3000x2000 for high-resolution printing Original image courtesy of NASA
	Lakes of Joux and Neuchâtel, and the French Jura Desktop size (331 KB) 1280x1024 optimized for your screen Full size with info (732 KB) 3000x2000 for high-resolution printing Original image courtesy of NASA
	Bern, Morat, and Bienne Desktop size (356 KB) 1280x1024 optimized for your screen Full size with info (1012 KB) 3000x2000 for high-resolution printing Original image courtesy of NASA
	From Lucerne to Basel Desktop size (365 KB) 1280x1024 optimized for your screen Full size with info (1008 KB) 3000x2000 for high-resolution printing Original image courtesy of NASA
	From Lucerne to Zurich Desktop size (450 KB) 1280x1024 optimized for your screen Full size with info (747 KB) 3000x2000 for high-resolution printing Original image courtesy of NASA