Discovery blasts off into space

The space shuttle Discovery took off Sunday from Cape Canaveral, Florida, on a mission of 13 days to the International Space Station (ISS).

The launch of the orbiter can been seen here at Nasa's Kennedy Space Centre in Florida. A fuel leak forced the US space agency to abort the shuttle's original launch on Wednesday.

"This mission has already been greatly delayed by dangerous leaks (fuel) and technical problems," said Florida from the BBC, Andy Gallacher.
"For NASA, this has meant a month of delays in repairs to the ISS," he added.


You can watch the video at:

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/7945318.stm

Among the seven astronauts is Koichi Wakata, the first tenant of the station with Japanese plans for a long stay. The crew delivered and installed the fourth and final set of solar panels that will be used to generate additional electricity at the station.