Space shuttle watchers on standby

People in West Berkshire can look out for the Discovery shuttle today (Friday) and tomorrow

STARGAZERS across West Berkshire will be able to look up to the heavens tonight to witness the end of an era as the space shuttle Discovery crosses our skies on its final journey.

The shuttle launched from the Kennedy Space Center in Florida at approximately 4.50pm local time (9.50pm GMT) yesterday (Thursday)

It will be visible, weather permitting, as it orbits Earth on its journey to the International Space Station (ISS) between 6.12pm and 6.15pm and again at about 7.43pm this evening and then again tomorrow (Saturday), when it will dock at the station.

Steve Harris, a member of the Newbury Astronomical Society, said today: “You will be able to see it with the naked eye, it will appear as bright as an airliner with its headlights on.

“I think I saw it last night, it was either that or the space station. It was very bright and it passes over quite quickly."

The shuttle travels at 17,180 miles per hour.

The mission, the last for the Discovery, is to last 11 days and will deliver a new store room and a sophisticated humanoid robot to the ISS.

Discovery was first launched in 1984 and this is its 39th journey.

When it lands back on Earth in nearly two weeks' time it will have covered a cumulative distance of 230 million km, a distance greater than from Earth to the sun.

Once the shuttle is retired, the plan is for US astronauts to hitch a ride to the space station on Russian rockets until the about the middle of the decade when

commercial companies should provide space capabilities in America.