14 DAY TRIAL // Yesterday, onlookers gathered around the Kennedy Space Center (KSC), in Cape Canaveral, Florida, had the chance to watch the space shuttle Atlantis soaring up to the skies in its final planned flight. Take off occurred at 2:20 pm EDT (1820 GMT), as per schedule, when the orbiter begin its 12-day mission to the International Space Station (ISS). It is delivering a new, Russian-built module called Rassvet, as well as scientific experiments, supplies and spare parts for the orbital facility.
“Commander Ken Ham is joined on the STS-132 mission by Pilot Tony Antonelli and Mission Specialists Garrett Reisman, Michael Good, Steve Bowen, and Piers Sellers, all veteran space fliers. Good and Sellers rode Atlantis into orbit on their first space missions in 2009 and 2002, respectively. The shuttle crew is scheduled to dock to the station at 10:27 am EDT on Sunday, May 16. The mission's three spacewalks will focus on storing spare components outside the station, including six batteries, a communications antenna and parts for the Canadian Dextre robotic arm,” NASA officials write in a press release.
“The folks have given us a great launch. The vehicle looks like it's in really clean shape, ready to go do a pretty challenging mission in front of us,” told reporters immediately after take-off the NASA associate administrator for space operations, Bill Gerstenmaier. “On behalf of all the manufacturing, processing, flight and launch teams that have worked on Atlantis since March of 1980, I'd like to wish you all good luck, Godspeed, and have a little fun up there,” told the crew before take-off Mike Leinbach, who is the NASA shuttle launch director.
“Thanks Mike. Those are great words, and like you said, there's a thousand folks out there that have taken care of this bird for a long time. Right now a special thanks to orbiter for getting us off the pad today. And we're going to take her on a 32nd flight, and if you don't mind, we'll take her out of the barn and make a few more laps around the planet,” responded Ham, as quoted by Space. The main part of Atlantis' mission will consist of “a whole lot of servicing tasks to basically set up the station – sort of brand-spanking-new condition for the post-shuttle period – changing out some batteries, putting in some new communication stuff, basically little upgrades across the station so it's in good shape for the long haul,” says Sellers, a mission specialist for STS-132.