Space Shuttle Atlantis Launch: Stunning Images From The Final Blast Off (PHOTOS)

Space Shuttle Atlantis launched for the last time today, marking the end of NASA's 30-year space shuttle program.

The final shuttle launch went off almost exactly as planned, and despite a gloomy forecast it was delayed by only a few minutes. As of 11:42 a.m. EDT NASA reported that the craft was successfully in orbit, and STS-135 has begun as planned.

You can see historic images of the final launch below, or click here to see some historic shots from past shuttle missions. Photos of the shuttle preparation can be seen here.

You can also take a look back at 30 years of the space shuttle program here.

Do you have photos from the launch? Send them to us by clicking "participate" below.

 

Get to see the launch in person? Send us your photos! Click "Add A Slide" and upload your own!

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Space Shuttle Atlantis Launch

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The space shuttle Atlantis lifts off from the Kennedy Space Center Friday, July 8, 2011, in Cape Canaveral, Fla. Atlantis is the 135th and final space shuttle launch for NASA. (AP Photo/Chris O'Meara)

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The space shuttle Atlantis lifts off from the Kennedy Space Center Friday, July 8, 2011, in Cape Canaveral, Fla. Atlantis is the 135th and final space shuttle launch for NASA. (AP Photo/Chris O'Meara)

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Comments

[Stageman]

02:17 AM on 07/11/2011

While unmanned missions work and can do the job of launching, if we are to continue launching satellites, we will need something to go up there and clean up all the junk. Otherwise we will be stuck here on earth because the space trash.

[Feurio]

05:47 PM on 07/10/2011

Another thing being outsourced. Give the rich more money, they'll certainly make things happen.

[NWBrunette]

01:03 AM on 07/10/2011

Aside from some critically important and wildly successful Hubble repair missions, the shuttle was a complete boondoggle, and a huge scientific waste of money. Happy to see it go. Unmanned missions are the way to go, as has been proved time and again.

[ContagiousRationality]

09:32 PM on 07/09/2011

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9eXfJ1Y2urE

I was lucky enough to see the Space Shuttle Endeavour Launch (STS-123) on March 11, 2008 at 02:28 AM EDT from NASA's Kennedy Space Center VIP area (about 3.2 miles away). Check out the link above for my amateur video of the launch.

I'm also looking forward to seeing Space Shuttle Discovery (the oldest orbiter) when it's decommissioned and moved to the Air and Space Museum annex (Udvar-Hazy Center) near Washington DC.

[Celebrindan]

02:34 PM on 07/09/2011

Someday this planet will run out of resources for us.

If we do not have the means IN PLACE to get them from someplace else, it will be TOO LATE to start the journey by then.

Since we're spending our kids money, don't we at least owe them something they will need?

[Celebrindan]

02:24 PM on 07/09/2011

I lived in Tucson in the early 80's.

The night before, on the news we were told that there was a chance of the shuttle landing at DMAFB in town.

Part of the first 747 piggyback-ride return to Kennedy, from the shuttle's very first landing at Edwards in CA.

At work that morning and a few of us were standing on what would eventually become the 3nd story floor of the Viscount Hotel on Broadway, which we'd poured the day before.

All of us gibbering about the news someone said it would come from that direction, pointing off to the southwest.

I said "No way. It would come down the 10, just like everyone else coming from L.A." and pointed northwest.

As I pointed, we all looked that way.

I said, "See that small dot, that plane coming in? That's the path it will follow."

As we looked, the dot got bigger, and bigger.

It got huge.

It was the shuttle, and the closer it got, the quieter Tucson got, traffic slowed, and then stopped altogether, everyone stopped, the whole town came to a silent standstill, looking up.

I looked around at my friends and saw a joy, and pride, on their faces.

Failing NASA means that we, as a nation, have stopped dreaming.

That is a terrible thing to know.

[SisterAnn]

01:13 PM on 07/09/2011

What is sad is the space program is going to be taken over by private business. All our investment in technology will be given to those who won't even pay taxes.

[Andy49]

12:39 PM on 07/09/2011

America is only first in one thing now, tax breaks for the super wealthy.

[Aleks Hunter]

08:45 AM on 07/09/2011

They all look alike.

[shylocxs]

06:31 AM on 07/09/2011

They're great pictures, and everything, but are you stunned? I mean stunned? Like "incapable of speech or other relevant action" stunned?

[wardropper]

09:41 AM on 07/09/2011

Most of us can use Photoshop as well as that by now...

[jonsen]

03:09 AM on 07/09/2011

hi
that's just gr8....

[Jack Daniels Esq]

02:11 AM on 07/09/2011

We wasted so much money in the ME where a couple elcheapo bombs woulda worked

[Danish Kapur]

07:25 PM on 07/08/2011

instead we should have used that money to create more jobs; 9.2% does not look nice

[ghostrider57]

09:43 PM on 07/08/2011

Think about all the jobs that were created and have been maintained during the shuttle program.

Now think about all the jobs that have been lost because the shuttle program has been discontinued.

Shame your only thought is that it is a waste of money. But then I shouldn't be surprised.

[Danish Kapur]

01:45 PM on 07/09/2011

It is just a comment. Why are you taking so seriously

[Aaron Watkins]

01:11 AM on 07/09/2011

Federal tax money does not create jobs. It buys temporary jobs.

[Celebrindan]

02:39 PM on 07/09/2011

umm, excuse me, Moderators?

Can we throw pies at people like this?

[Feurio]

05:45 PM on 07/10/2011

Ok, no more money to infrastructure and schools. Let's experiment away.

[AntiClast]

03:16 PM on 07/08/2011

The space shuttle seemed to come out of nowhere. The Huntsville group, headed by Werner von Braun, were exceptional men with incalculable experience in building rockets. They never recommended a kluge like the shuttle.

Somebody at NASA headquarters or outside pushed for the shuttle system. Who? Why? I heard once that the shuttle system had literally been designed on the back of an envelope. Nixon cancelled several moon flights. He built a system which had no ability to go beyond close earth orbit. Why?

The aims for the shuttle were grandiose. Challenger was launched on a ridiculously cold day -- I was fuming about it prelaunch. What I didn't know was the severity of the winds. For the first time ever they called in the ships from sea because the water was too rough. Yet they launched as scheduled. They had to launch Galileo in April on a strict time schedule to meet the requirements of flight to Jupiter. They also had a much delayed intelligence satellite to be launched.

After Challenger was shaken to death by winds aloft, the impossible schedules for military and commercial customers were ditched. They didn't need manned space flight to accomplish the goals of those customers anyway.

I'd like to know the story behind the ditching of the successful Apollo program, the dumping of the German rocket scientists, the moving to another technological path entirely, and the grand plans to be a trucking service to earth orbit. Who dreamed up and sold this stuff?

[onlythetruthcounts]

05:07 PM on 07/08/2011

I don't understand why we can't have Apollo type missions today... One reason could be our education system is failing us all. Most kids today can't find their own state on a map not to mention another country.

[flossophy]

11:24 PM on 07/08/2011

public education.

[NWBrunette]

01:11 AM on 07/10/2011

We had Apollo missions back when the ultra-wealthy weren't getting in.sane and endless tax breaks - the top rate back then was like three times what it is now. And people like Warren Buffet actually paid a higher rate than their secretaries (imagine that). There was actually money to get it accomplished. And it cost a lot of money. The fact that the shuttle can only get to low Earth orbit instead of to the moon is perfectly representative of how our priorities have changed.

[jimbobuddy]

10:14 PM on 07/08/2011

Challenger was not 'shaken to death'. The O ring on the right SRB failed. Let's remain in the realm of reality, shall we?

[principessafernanda zeno]

01:07 PM on 07/08/2011

sono cosi' emozionata vedere il lancio del sattelite per lo Spazio per l' ultima volta. !