Endeavour has blasted off on its final space shuttle flight as the mission commander’s wounded wife, the US congresswoman Gabrielle Giffords, watched along with an exhilarated crowd well into the thousands.Nasa is winding down its 30-year-old shuttle programme before embarking on something new. The event generated the kind of excitement seldom seen near Kennedy Space Centre on such a grand scale, despite a delay of more than two weeks because of an electrical problem.Just before the launch, commander Mark Kelly said: “It’s in the DNA of our great country to reach for the stars and explore. We must not stop. To all the millions watching today, including our spouses, children, family and friends, we thank you for your support.”

Remarkably, Giffords made a return visit to see Kelly off. She is recovering in a Houston hospital from a gunshot wound to the head after an assassination attempt less than four months ago.

The Arizona congresswoman was shielded from the cameras on launch day, as were the families of the other five astronauts. She has kept out of the public eye since the shooting on 8 January that wounded her and killed six in Tucson, Arizona.

With Kelly at the helm, Endeavour and its crew of five Americans and an Italian are heading for the international space station. After arriving at the orbiting outpost, the mission will deliver a $2bn magnetic instrument that will seek out antimatter and dark energy in the universe.

Up to 45,000 guests jammed into Nasa’s launch site, and thousands packed local roads and towns to see Endeavour launch. Advance estimates had put the crowd at 50,000, more than the number that saw Discovery’s final flight in February. Across the Indian river in Titusville, though, the number of spectators appeared to be down compared with Endeavour’s previous launch attempt.

Electrical trouble grounded the shuttle on 29 April, disappointing the hordes of visitors, including President Barack Obama and his family.

“God Speed Endeavour We’re ready for you!” space station resident Ronald Garan Jr said in a Twitter update. At launch, the space station was 220 miles high, just south-ease of Halifax, Nova Scotia.

Kelly almost didn’t make the flight. The 47-year-old navy captain took leave from training to be by his wife’s side after she was wounded. He was gone a month, and it seemed unlikely he would make the space flight he had been training for. But Giffords’s condition improved and she was moved from the hospital in her hometown of Tucson to Houston where Kelly lives. A month after the shooting, he announced he would be joining the mission.

“Everybody felt that this was the right thing for me to do,” he said at the time. He added that his wife “is a big supporter of my career, a big supporter of Nasa”.

He rejoined his crew in February, still managing to see his wife on the other side of town every morning and evening.

Giffords’s visit to Kennedy Space Centre – the third time she has seen her husband launch into space – ratcheted up the excitement for what already was a big event, said launch officials.

Kelly’s identical twin, Scott, who is also an astronaut, witnessed the launch with his two teenage nieces, Mark’s daughters from a previous marriage.

Endeavour, the baby of the Nasa shuttle fleet, was built to replace Challenger, destroyed during lift-off 25 years ago. It made its maiden journey six years later to capture and repair a stranded satellite

Endeavour carried the first Hubble space telescope repair team, which famously restored the observatory’s vision in 1993, and the first American piece of the space station in 1998.

It will end its days at the California Science Centre in Los Angeles.

Endeavour has so far logged more than 116m miles, circled Earth some 4,500 times, spent 283 days in space and carried 170 people, including the last two people to fly a space shuttle for the first time.
•guardian.co.uk © Guardian News and Media Limited 2011

Category: Aviation, TechnologyTags: endeavor launch, endeavor shuttle final voyage, NASA space shuttle, Space shuttle Endeavour lifts off on its final mission, US congresswoman Gabrielle Giffords sees husband Mark Kelly take the helm as Nasa shuttle nears retirementComments are closed.