CAPE CANAVERAL, Fla. -- Space shuttle Discovery successfully launched at 5:21 a.m. central daylight time with Ashland, Neb., native Clayton Anderson aboard.
Several Nebraskans made the trip to Florida to celebrate Anderson's second trip into space.
Winter Olympian and former Husker football player Curt Tomasevicz arrived at the Kennedy Space Center with his gold medal, drawing fans of his own as he posed with some in the waiting crowd.
Tomasevicz, who minored in astronomy at UNL, said he secretly dreamed of becoming an astronaut. On Monday, a piece of his life - two of the gloves he used as a pusher on the U.S. bobsled team - made it into orbit, tucked among the many Nebraska mementos Anderson took into space.
Tomasevicz compared the launch to the Olympics. It takes years and years of preparation, then it's all over in an instant, he said.
Tomasevicz summed up the launch experience with a single word, "Wow."
The crowd was able to watch Anderson and his fellow crew members on a big screen TV, following many of the early morning preparations. At one point, Anderson looked into the camera, flashed Mr. Spock's famous V sign and mouthed words familiar to all Star Trek fans, "Live long and prosper."
Nebraskan Linda Beermann said the experience reminded her of a state fair - everybody was excited and in good spirits.
Her husband, Allen Beermann, executive director of the Nebraska Press Association, marveled at all the teamwork that went into the launch, from the support and work of taxpayers to engineers to ground crew members.
Allen Beermann sent two First Amendment ties into space with Anderson. After the crew returns - tentatively set for April 18 - the Newseum in Washington, D.C., will receive one of the ties.
Anderson also took two of World-Herald editorial cartoonist Jeff Koterba's cartoons on the shuttle.
Koterba described the atmosphere at the launch as festive, with a bigger-than-usual crowd gathering to watch one of the last four launches before NASA ends its shuttle program to the International Space Station.
In the final minutes before takeoff, Koterba said, the crowd stood to sing the National Anthem. Koterba said it was one of the most moving renditions he had ever heard.
Afterward, a feeling of reverence set in as the crowd remained standing for the final countdown and the night sky shifted to early morning light at liftoff.
About sixty people gathered in the ConAgra theater at the Strategic Air & Space Museum in Anderson's hometown of Ashland.
Sitting in the front row were Kelly Jacob and Kirsti Taylor of Omaha. They brought their kids Patrick Taylor, 9, Ryan Taylor, 12, Erin Jacob, 8 and Matthew Jacob 4, to watch the liftoff. All were on spring break.
After liftoff the crowd spontaneously broke into applause. Kirsti Taylor was glad to see so many, young and old turn out. One kid in the crowd I did not see who said "Look out for black holes!"
The launch — the last one scheduled in darkness for NASA's fading shuttle program — helped set a record for the most women in space at the same time. Three women are aboard Discovery, and another is already at the International Space Station, making for an unprecedented foursome. The shuttle should arrive at the space station on Wednesday.
Problems with Discovery's main antenna cropped up as soon as the shuttle reached orbit and could impact the radar needed for the rendezvous, Mission Control said. A spokesman stressed there were other tools to work around the situation. “We probably won't have answers for you today about what this means,” Mission Control told the astronauts.
The nearly two-week mission will stock the space station with supplies and experiments.
In a rare treat, the space station passed over the launch site 15 minutes before Discovery blasted off and was easily visible, resembling a big, brilliant star in the clear morning sky with the moon as a backdrop. There was a chorus of “ooooh” from spectators. By launch time, the outpost had traveled almost all the way across the Atlantic.
World-Herald photographer Kent Sievers and World-Herald editorial cartoonist Jeff Koterba contributed to this report, which includes material from the Associated Press..
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Video of the shuttle's takeoff
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