Story Continues Below"It'll be a beautiful launch," said Mike Leinbach, Shuttle Launch Director during a news conference following the Mission Management team meeting today. "You'll see it all the way up the East Coast."

NASA's youngest orbiter, Endeavour has only two flights left on its manifest and STS-130 promises to be a memorable one. The shuttle's 13 day mission will deliver Node 3, named "Tranquility" to the International Space Station along with the seven-windowed cupola that will give astronauts aboard the complex a never-before seen 360-degree view of the space station, Earth below and outer space above.

STS-130 is the first of five flights this year. Those missions represent the final launches on NASA's space shuttle manifest and the fleet will be retired to museums following the final flight. Fly-out of the shuttle progam has been in work since former President George W. Bush announced the Vision for Space Exploration in 2004, which called for the fleet to be retired following completion of ISS in 2010.

Although not a surprise, the looming end of the shuttle era is starting to be felt acutely within NASA and the communities that support the agency, particulary amongst the workers who service the shuttle at Kennedy Space Center.

"We knew it was coming, but when you finally get that final word, then there's no turning back," said Leinbach. "This is it. And people are coming to grips with that now."

The sentiment in the general public and the mainly small businesses who serve the space community echo Leinbach's statement. If one word could characterize the mood along the Space Coast, it would be "scared." Many business owners understand that they will face even tougher times than the current recession when the shuttle progam ends, especially without Constellation to make up for some of the lost work.

The unemployment rate in Brevard County alone could top 15% later next year when over 7,000 aerospace workers lose their jobs and potentially result in the loss of an additional 20,000 jobs in the local community.

But this weekend, those concerns are being set aside, at least somewhat, as the Space Coast prepares for another shuttle launch and with it, celebrates the 30 year legacy of a program that has come to define the people and places where Kennedy Space Center and it's workers call home.

Tomorrow morning, at 8 o'clock, the Rotating Service Structure will be retracted from around Endeavour to leave the shuttle standing alone on its launch platform as the final hours of the countdown tick away.

Loading of the external tank with 500,000 gallons of supercold liquid hyhdrogen and liquid oxygen will commence at 7:14 p.m. EST. The astronauts will leave their quarters in the Operations and Checkout Building at around 12:45 a.m. Sunday morning and will board Endeavour for launch.

(The Spacearium / SpaceflightNews.net)