Shuttle Discovery heads for space station

US: After a successful liftoff, the US space shuttle Discovery headed for the International Space Station early Monday, carrying a final pair of solar panels due to be installed ahead of the arrival of an expanded space crew.

The spacecraft launched from the Kennedy Space Center in Florida at 7:43 pm (2343 GMT) Sunday and reached orbit just over eight minutes later. The journey to the station was expected to take two days.

Mike Leinbach, launch director for the mission, said the liftoff was picture perfect.

"I have seen a lot of launches ... and this was the most visually beautiful," he told reporters in a briefing. "It was just spectacular. When the orbiter and the tank, booster got up in the sun light ... It was just gorgeous."

The mission, one of the last major tasks of the more than decade-long effort to construct the station, has been shortened by one day after a hydrogen leak last week led to a scrub of an earlier launch date. But NASA officials said that the problem had been cleared up and that there has been no recurrence of the malfunction.

The leak was discovered Wednesday, when the external tank was 98 percent full of liquid hydrogen prompting it to be emptied for the checks. In all, the shuttle mission was delayed five times since February.

Once the Discovery mission installs the solar truss last major segment to be attached to the ISS which itself was begun in 1998 the space station will become fully operational and capable of housing six astronauts, the National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA) said.

Cape Canaveral, Florida, AFP