One Last Night Departure

The Last Shuttle To Leave Earth at Night, SpaceRef

"An hour after the orange glow of Endeavour's liftoff lit the Kennedy Space Center press site on Feb. 8, NASA officials beamed at the bit of bright news illuminating an otherwise tough couple of weeks. The smooth countdown for STS-130 and the relatively few technical problems -- a bit of foam loss, but nothing judged too serious -- shifted the tone of the press conference to one that joked about workers missing the Super Bowl. "While I was getting evil glares for making them come in -- I don't know why it was my fault -- they were happy with the result," said Mike Moses, the shuttle program's launch integration manager, as journalists chuckled."