The National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA) have announced the final retirement destination of its retiring space shuttles during Tuesday’s commemoration of the 30^th anniversary of Space Shuttle Columbia’s maiden launch.

Shuttle Discovery, NASA’s most experienced and oldest remaining spacecraft, will be on display at the National Air and Space Museum of the Smithsonian Institution at the Steven F. Udvar-Hazy Center near Dulles International Airport.

Endeavour, due to make its final mission this month, will be displayed at the California Science Center, located a few miles from the old Rockwell plant where it was developed and construction supervised.

Shuttle Atlantis, which will close the shuttle program in June, will stay at the  Kennedy Space Center where it will be displayed at the visitor center complex. Being the starting point of most shuttle missions, the Kennedy Space Center was chosen as the retirement center of the Atlantis because NASA Administrator Charles Bolden flew one of his four missions in the spacecraft.

Meanwhile, the test orbiter Enterprise, which has been on display at the Smithsonian Institution since 1982 and at the Udvar-Hazy Center since 2003, will move to the Intrepid Sea, Air and Space Museum in New York City, to pave the way for Discovery’s exhibition at the Smithsonian Institution.

NASA is planning to transfer the three shuttles to their respective museums by early to middle of 2012. Shuttles bound for museums outside Florida will be connected to the back of NASA’s modified Boeing 747 airliner to be transported to their new homes. Cranes will be used to offload the shuttles from the carrier to the airports of the destination cities.

The announcement of Administrator Bolden came three years after the agency made an initial announcement that the space shuttles would be awarded to US museums or educational institutions. The respective museums need to build an environmentally-controlled indoor exhibition space and should have the $28.8 million needed funds to prepare the orbiter for transport. Congress waived the needed fees for the Smithsonian Institution.

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