NASA's latest repair job was the Hubble Space Telescope, a remarkable instrument that's given us incredible images of the universe.
Orbiting some 350 miles up, it's been called the "people's telescope" because its images appear everywhere.
And while this week marked the last time human hands will touch Hubble, astronauts successfully refurbished the telescope so its impact will be felt by generations to come.
But Hubble's life almost never happened.
Launched in 1990 with lofty expectations and a US$1 billion price tag, an imperfection in Hubble's mirror meant its pictures were blurry and quickly became the butt of jokes.
In many ways, the future of NASA hung in the balance as astronauts brought Hubble a high-tech pair of glasses in 1993. And to the delight of NASA engineers the fix worked and beautiful images of the universe quickly turned Hubble's trouble into history.
By restoring the imaging of Hubble, people were able to see things that were even more spectacular than anybody ever imagined.
It allowing scientists to see almost back to the big bang, billions of years into the past.
This latest and last mission to Hubble was tabled in the wake of the Columbia disaster, but eventually resurrected.
NASA says the telescope is now in better shape than it has ever been and is able to see places in the universe that Galileo could only have dreamed of.
CBS News