CAPE CANAVERAL, Fla. -- Space shuttle Endeavour and its crew of six blazed a brilliant trail into orbit Friday, taking off on the first construction flight of the international space station.
"Let's go do this," said commander Robert Cabana, who along with his crew waited a full year for this day."Amen," a launch controller replied.
The entire sky flashed when Endeavour's boosters ignited at 3:35 a.m. EST. The shuttle shone like a bright star and was visible for more than seven minutes as it sped out over the Atlantic and up the East Coast.
Eight minutes into the flight, Endeavour was cruising in orbit, bound for a Sunday rendezvous with the first space station component launched by the Russians. The component had just passed over Cape Canaveral when the shuttle blasted off. The full moon gleamed as the chase began.
Endeavour is carrying Part 2, an American-built connecting passageway that the astronauts will attach to the piece that preceded them into orbit by two weeks.
Secretary of State Madeleine Albright was among the dignitaries from around the world who returned for Endeavour's second launch attempt. The first, on Thursday, was scrapped when the master alarm in the shuttle cockpit went off with just 4 1/2 minutes remaining in the countdown. This time, the alarm behaved.
Another alarm sounded, however, soon after Endeavour reached orbit. One of three hydraulic power units overheated, and the pilots switched to a backup controller to cool it before shutting down each unit as planned. Mission Control said engineers were looking into the problem but did not expect it to impact the 12-day flight.
Sixteen countries have teamed up to build the outpost in the sky, one year late in the making because of a cash crunch in Russia that has stalled work on a crucial control module.
Forty-three more U.S. and Russian launches will be needed over the next five years to haul up space station parts. And 162 spacewalks will be required to put all the pieces together and keep them maintained; the first three are slated for Endeavour's flight.
Once the first two components are connected with the help of Endeavour's robot arm and thrusters -- the hardest job of the mission, according to the crew -- Jerry Ross and James Newman will go out to join all the electrical connections and cables by hand. They'll also attach handrails and other tools for future crews.