Atlantis Shuttle Launch

By Stephen Kral on May 11th, 2009

• Share
• Link to StumbleUpon
• 2 Comments

In what is being billed the “riskiest shuttle mission ever” the Atlantis space shuttle successfully launched earlier this afternoon in start to a mission to repair the Hubble telescope. The mission will include a seven-man crew — who will complete five spacewalks (seven hours each) atop the telescope in the hopes of adding repairs that would bring up to five years additional life to the now nineteen-year-old telescope.

The mission manager, Preston Burch said “This will be the most challenging servicing mission that’s been faced by our astronauts in terms of the total amount of work.” He then detailed the extent of the astronaut’s work which included the installation of new cameras, gyroscopes and batteries as well as the repair of two broken science instruments.

The launch took place at 2:01 PM EDT at the Kennedy Space Centre at Cape Canaveral, Florida and was deemed a success. In an effort to increase the mission’s visibility, the launch was available through the official NASA website as a live video stream. The stream included pre-launch preparations, the launch and post-launch commentary.

The entire mission will come with a $1 billion price tag.

(Photo courtesy of Matt Stroshane/Getty Images North America)