Table of Contents

The Ultimate Thrill Ride

Transcript

Space Shuttle Endeavour is on the launch pad and her crew of seven, including Canadian astronaut Julie Payette, is strapped in, preparing to blast off to the International space Station, on one of the most ambitious space construction missions ever attempted.

Years of training have led up to this moment but the final thrilling part of the journey to space begins here.

The crew climbed into the Shuttle two hours ago.

Now mission control's clock begins to tick down the final minutes to launch.

At T minus 9 minutes, the clock stops. This is a 10 to 20-minute holding pattern built-in to the countdown sequence, where a final round of checks are being made.

When the checks are done, countdown resumes.

It's T minus 9 minutes.

The ground launch sequencer computer takes over and begins to automatically control all countdown functions.

At this point, all that Julie can do is sit back and wait. She mentally goes through all her training to make sure everything goes smoothly.

It's T-2 minutes and the Shuttle crew close and lock their visors.

At 50 seconds before launch the Shuttle transfers from ground to internal power.

At 31 seconds before launch, the Shuttle's on-board computers begin their final launch sequence.

At 10 seconds, the main Shuttle engines get a go for start.

With a thunderous roar that is heard for miles, the solid rocket boosters ignite, lifting the more than 2 million kilogram spaceship off the ground.

By the time Endeavour passes the launch tower it will already be going nearly 200 km an hour. Less than a minute later, thanks to more than 7.8 million pounds of thrust, the Shuttle will break the sound barrier.

Throughout the ascent phase, as flight engineer, Julie is assisting the Commander and the Pilot, monitoring all navigation systems and keeping tabs on Endeavour's trajectory and movements.

Only eight and half minutes later, reaching a speed of 8 kilometers per second, Endeavour and her crew finally reach orbit - more than 300 kilometers above the Earth.