Music.
The launch of space shuttle Endeavour lit up dark skies along the east coast of Florida on March 11, 2008.
On board were STS-123 Commander Dom Gorie; Pilot Greg Johnson; and Mission Specialists Bob Behnken (BANK-en),
Mike Foreman, Rick Linnehan, Garrett Reisman (REESE-man), and Takao Doi (tah-cowe DOY)
from the Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency, also known as JAXA.
Inside Endeavour's payload bay were the mission's primary payloads: the first section of the JAXA's Kibo laboratory
and the Canadian Space Agency's two-armed robotic system, known as Dextre (Dex-ter).
After a two-day orbital chase, Endeavour caught up to the station and Gorie gently maneuvered
the winged orbiter to a smooth docking at 11:49 p.m. Eastern.
With docking complete, Reisman took his place aboard the station as the Expedition 16
Flight Engineer replacing European Space Agency astronaut Léopold Eyharts (a'-arts).
The mission's toughest tasks still lay ahead, beginning with the first spacewalk on flight day four.
Linnehan and Reisman spent seven hours in the vacuum of space as they prepared the Japanese
Experiment Logistics Module-Pressurized Section for its move to the station.
Then, with Doi at the controls and Gorie assisting, the module was installed at its temporary home on the Harmony Node.
The spacewalking duo also began assembly of the Dextre robot by installing the
mechanisms that act as the robot's two hands.
Japan's presence on the space station became official the following day as Doi and station
Commander Peggy Whitson opened the hatch to the pressurized logistics module.
During the second spacewalk, Linnehan and Foreman attached both of Dextre's 11-foot-long arms.
Once Reisman and Behnken tested the arms' joint brakes, they moved the arms,
bringing the robot to life and setting the stage for the mission's third spacewalk.
On that seven-hour excursion, Linnehan and Behnken finished assembling Dextre by installing a
tool holder along with the camera assembly that will serve as the robot's eyes.
Finally, Eyharts and Johnson used the station's Canadarm2 to move the robot to its
new location on top of the U.S. Destiny laboratory.
The highlight of the fourth spacewalk was a test of a special caulk-gun-like device called the
Tile Repair Ablator Dispenser, or "T-RAD."
Behnken and Foreman used the device to apply a gooey substance called Shuttle Tile Ablator-54
to samples of heat shield tiles that were intentionally damaged for testing.
The test samples will be analyzed on Earth to determine how well the repair technique works.
The pair teamed up again two days later for the mission's fifth -- and final -- spacewalk.
Over the course of six hours, they temporarily stowed the shuttle's heat shield inspection tool,
the Orbiter Boom Sensor System on the station's truss, installed the MISSE-6 experiment,
and inspected the station's right Solar Alpha Rotary Joint, or SARJ (sarge).
Endeavour pulled away from the International Space Station at 8:25 p.m. Eastern March 24,
wrapping up a record 12 days of docked operations.
On Endeavour's 250th orbit of the Earth, the orbiter and its STS-123 crew touched down at 8:39 p.m. on March 26
on Kennedy Space Center's Runway 15, for the 22nd night landing of the shuttle program.