(photo by Mark Simpson)

The space shuttle Endeavour is waiting at the Kennedy Space Center for its final flight to Los Angeles, where it will be transported at a stately pace through the city to its final home at the California Science Center.

WMFE's Mark Simpson has been visiting the Space Center and photographing the preparations.

(photo by Mark Simpson)

The Endeavour will be flown on the back of a modified 747, known as the shuttle carrier. It was lifted onto the back of the 747 this weekend and bolted into place.

(photo by Mark Simpson)

The structure around the shuttle is called the mate/demate device.

(photo by Mark Simpson)

(photo by Mark Simpson)

(photo by Mark Simpson)

Here's a close-up of the attachment:

(photo by Mark Simpson)

If the weather cooperates, the Endeavour will leave Florida Wednesday morning. We'll have more pictures after the launch.

Can't get enough of the space shuttle program? We were there when the Atlantis made the final flight of the space shuttle program. Here's the last flight of the Discovery. The Enterprise came to New York -- and WNYC crowdsourced photos of it flying over the city. We saw it sitting on the tarmac at JFK. TN even saw it sailing up the Hudson. Now it's on permanent exhibit at the Intrepid. And some parts of the program are being repurposed: NASA's giant crawler got a tune-up for its post-shuttle life.