The space shuttle Atlantis roared up from the Kennedy Space Center Friday on the 135th and final mission in America's 30-year space shuttle program, one in which Canada has played a significant supporting role.
Canadian astronaut Bob Thirsk, in Florida with several Canadian space program veterans, said the launch evoked a mixture of "joy and relief. And privilege, because it was the last shuttle launch and it is the end of an era. I was part of it."
Thirsk, 57, a British Columbia native who flew on a shuttle in 1996, watched the liftoff not far from the launch pad, surrounded by TV transmission trucks and with his "astronaut friends," fellow Canadian shuttle veterans Dave Williams and Chris Hadfield.
Thirsk's relief was because the four U.S. crew members aboard Atlantis - Commander Chris Ferguson, pilot Doug Hurley, and mission specialists Rex Walheim and Sandy Magnus - are all dear friends and "what we do is rather risky and daring."
This is the fi nal shuttle mission because the program was cancelled last year by the publicly-funded U.S. National Aeronautics and Space Administration so it can focus its efforts on missions to the rest of our solar system. But the race is on in the private sector to build a replacement for the shuttle to ferry U.S. and other crews - including Canadians - to the station, which will operate in low-Earth orbit until at least 2020, possibly 2028.
Such a vehicle is not likely to be ready, however, until at least 2016. Until then, the U.S. and Canada will rely on Russian Soyuz rockets to get to and from the space station.
Watching from her car parked next to Highway 1 along Indian River in Titusville, Fla., with a direct view of the launch site across the water, Roxie Richardson, 22, burst into tears as the shuttle's golden plume made its way up to and through the grey clouds.
"It's such a feeling of pride, of patriotism, to watch it go up," she said.
Her boyfriend, Ni k Silva, 29, said the launch was "breathtaking. I don't feel that I ever rooted for something as much." The couple drove for about an hour from their inland home to watch a shuttle launch for the first - and last - time.
Robert Nieto, 57, was about three blocks from the shore when he saw the fiery tail rising. "Wow. They're gone," the retired pest control worker said. "I drove all the way from Corpus Christie (Texas) to see this at least once in my life."
Despite only a slim, 30 per cent chance of clear-enough weather needed for a launch, the spacecraft blasted off at 11: 29 a.m., only three minutes later than planned. The voice of mission control announced it as the "final liftoff of Atlantis, shoulders of the space shuttle. America will continue the dream."
An estimated 750,000 to one million people were on Florida's space coast to watch the launch up close. Some said it was a sad day for the area, with hundreds of local job layoffs resulting from the end of the shuttle program.
The 12-day mission is bringing the Raffaello module packed with 11,340 kilograms of supplies and spare parts for the space station and the Robotic Refueling Mission, a refrigerator-sized fake satellite that the Canadian-built Dextre robot will grapple in an experiment to simulate refuelling satellites on orbit, a hot emerging market, experts say.
Article Source KBG Test Blog (http://rc.kbg.me)
