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The shuttle Endeavour has successfully docked with the International Space Station (ISS). Before docking, the shuttle performed a backflip, allowing the ISS team to photograph Endeavour's heat shield to see if it has suffered launch damage. When the two crews join together shortly there will be a record 13 astronauts on the orbiting outpost. During their 11-day visit, the shuttle team will finish work on a Japanese research laboratory called Kibo. Endeavour was finally launched successfully from the Kennedy Space Center, Florida, on Wednesday after five failed attempts.

HOUSTON - The international space station's toilet trouble appeared to be taken care of Wednesday after a Russian cosmonaut replaced a malfunctioning pump. The space station's toilet broke two weeks ago. The problem — confined to the urine side of the commode — forced the orbiting outpost's crew of an American astronaut and two Russian cosmonauts to flush manually with extra water several times a day. Space shuttle Discovery brought up a new pump for the toilet, as well as the space station's newest room, a $1 billion Japanese lab. Oleg Kononenko spent more than two hours installing the new...

This will be the official thread for the launching of the Space Shuttle Discovery..

CAPE CANAVERAL, Fla. - After being rushed in from Russia, a toilet pump was loaded into space shuttle Discovery on Thursday just in time for this weekend's liftoff to the international space station, where the lone commode is acting up. A NASA employee based in Moscow hand-carried the pump on a commercial flight that touched down Wednesday night. Within hours, the pump and related equipment were packed away aboard Discovery. Discovery is scheduled to blast off Saturday on a 14-day mission. The main delivery item is a 37-foot-long Japanese lab; it will be the biggest room once installed at the...

Cape Canaveral FL (SPX) Apr 17, 2008 The cargo aboard the space shuttle Discovery on mission STS-124 already has traveled halfway around Earth, more than 10,000 miles over land and sea. It's now ready for the culmination of its 23-year journey to the International Space Station. Hope will take flight on Discovery. Or rather, the centerpiece of Kibo, a laboratory complex named for the Japanese word for hope, will take flight. STS-124 will launch the main segment of the Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency's - or JAXA's - station laboratory. Kibo's Japanese Pressurized Module, or JPM, is 14.4 feet in diameter...