Cue the music for "A Space Odyssey." This is cool

Earlier today we republished some pictures that Italian astronaut Paolo Nespoli took of the International Space Station while the shuttle Endeavour was still docked to the orbital complex.

Now NASA has released a video shot by Nespoli while he and two fellow crew members were leaving the space station in their Russian Soyuz spacecraft. If I said the accompanying video was mind-blowing, that would just be more useless hyperbole which fails miserably to match the magnificence of the moment. So watch it for yourselves.

For the history buffs out there, the Soyuz capsule had never headed for home while a shuttle was parked at the space station, providing this rare opportunity for the photo and video session.