NASA’s Orion capsule blasts off on ‘first step’ to Mars

CAPE CANAVERAL: The US space agency´s Orion capsule blasted off Friday on its first journey into orbit, in a key test flight before carrying people to deep space destinations like Mars in the coming years.

The unmanned spacecraft soared into space at 7:05 am (1205 GMT) atop a United Launch Alliance Delta IV Heavy rocket that rumbled and roared as it climbed into pastel skies over the Florida coast at sunrise, leaving a plume of smoke in its wake.

Cheers could be heard at Kennedy Space Center as the rocket took off, though the crowds were thinner than they were on Thursday, when 27,000 people showed up for a launch that was delayed by wind gusts and technical problems.

All those concerns vanished on Friday, however.

"It was just a blast to see how well the rocket did," said Orion program manager Mark Geyer.

"Being near a launch -- a rocket that big -- you can feel it," he said.

The launch is the first in more than 40 years of a US spacecraft intended to carry humans beyond the Moon. It has reinvigorated a US human exploration program that has been stagnant for more than three years since the last American space shuttle carried a crew of astronauts to the International Space Station.

The 30-year shuttle program ended in 2011, leaving the United States no option but to pay Russia to carry astronauts on its Soyuz capsules at a cost of $71 million per seat. (AFP)