Today, Saturday, the Atlantis launched at 11:15am on its way to continue work on the space station. The ship carried 6 astronauts on it, along with one of the heaviest cargos. The cargo weighed about 17 ½ tons. The crew was short one man do to the extra weight it carried. This launch was the first one since the Columbia incident in 2003. The crew has been trained extra and is happy that they were. The extra training will be a lot of help, being that they are going up to install a big part of the space station. The mission will consist of three space walks. The crew is happy to finally launch being that this launch was delayed a few times, for different reasons. Some of the complications they ran into were weather, and sensor troubles. The sensor delay cost NASA a lot of money. On a brighter side, NASA saw this as a clean launch with very few complications. The station is expected to be finished in 2010, and there will be several launches till then from the U.S. and allied countries to finish the work. I feel that NASA was smart in taking the extra time and money to train the astronauts extra. NASA spends alot of money each year for experiments, tests, and equipment. Spending alittle extra to ensure the safety of the crew, I think was very important. Ever since the Columbia incident it is very important that NASA check, recheck, and check again, to make sure everything is working properly. The cost of the extra precautions is worth the final product (space station) in my opinion.
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