Flight of Discovery

Although I have other things to post about, today I'm just going to post pictures of Discovery's launch. After Discovery was postpone for several days, last evening at dusk, she lifted off with a perfect launch. I hope everyone had an opportunity to watch the launch.

As many of you know, we live about 90 miles north of Cape Canaveral so we can't actually see the lift-off, but when the space shuttle clears the trees toward the south, it is a beautiful sight. I'm posting a series of pictures I took as Discovery headed for the heavens. I always watch the actual lift-off on the NASA channel, and then have about 20 seconds to get out on the deck before I see the first signs of the shuttle through the trees. I hope you enjoy the pictures.

The view of Discovery just as it clears the trees.
It looks like a little star on the horizon.

As it gets higher in the sky.

Now you start seeing the contrail.

It is starting to really pick up speed at this point.

As you can tell it is traveling at a great speed and gaining altitude rapidly.

At this point it is traveling quite rapidly and is approximately 70 miles high.

This is the residual contrail in the night sky.

If it had been a little darker at launch, I would have been able to show you how the southern sky really lights up at launch. Well, maybe next time.