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CAPE CANAVERAL, Florida (AFP) – The US expanse shuttle Discovery was forthcoming the International Space Station Saturday as conception of its test odyssey into orbit, carrying to researchers a newborn module and a robot.

The shuttle, which blamed off from the President Space Center here on Thursday, is ordered to cut with the ISS at 2:15 pm (1915 GMT). Its 11-day assignment includes digit spacewalks.

"It has been a pretty large day in expanse flight for us," said Bill Gerstenmaier, NASA assort honcho for expanse operations.

The modify of the shuttle information module create a opened hole in the US expanse information during a punctuation of belt-tightening and budget freezes, and module yield Russia's expanse capsules as the sole installation option to the ISS.

"Bittersweet" was the word of the day at President Space Center as astronauts, engineers and expanse fans packed in to get a glimpse of story by watching Discovery's crowning start 27 years after it prototypal flew into space.

"There is no doubt the expanse shuttle is an engineering marvel," said NASA honcho technologist Bob Braun.

"But it is an senior vehicle. It is 30 years old; it was designed belike a decennium before that," he said.

"I conceive we every discern we requirement to go to the next chapter. But some instance you go to that next chapter, it is bittersweet."

The Discovery gathering plans to hit the Permanent Multipurpose Module, with player hardware expanse and an area for experiments, as substantially as some spare parts and the Express Logistic Carrier, an outside papers for large equipment.

The shuttle module also alter the prototypal mechanism mechanism to the ISS. The Robonaut 2, or R2, is a render project of General Motors and NASA and module meet behind as a imperishable doc of the expanse station when Discovery leaves.

When Discovery wraps up this tour, the oldest extant shuttle module hit flown more missions than some of its cohorts and toted 180 grouping into space, including the prototypal someone shuttle commander and the prototypal African-American spacewalker.

The other digit shuttles are scheduled for their test flights after this year: Endeavour on Apr 19 and Atlantis on June 28.

Discovery has busted newborn connector binary times since it prototypal launched in 1984. It transported the Hubble Space telescope, was the prototypal to rendezvous with the Slavonic Mir Space Station, and delivered conception of the Asian Kibo work to the ISS.

The shuttle was also the prototypal to convey to expanse after digit major disasters: the Challenger discharge in 1986 and the Columbia hardship in 2003, when the shuttle broke up on its convey toward Earth.

Discovery has circled the sphere more than 5,600 times and logged 142 meg miles (230 meg kilometers) over its 352 days in space.

Rachel Wiedemann, a Boeing advance organise live with monitoring the shuttle's energy endorsement shield, said the start day was emotional.

"This is the vehicle I am closest to, that I hit the most undergo employed with," said Wiedemann. "It's my baby."

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