NASA managers have finally announced the launch date for STS-123, the space mission in which shuttle Endeavour will deliver the first module of the Japanese laboratory, Japanese Experiment Module (Kibō = hope) and the Canadian Special Purpose Dexterous Manipulator (SPDM) Dextre robotics system to the International Space Station.

The launch of the 16-day mission will take place at NASA's Kennedy Space Center in Florida at 1:28 a.m. CDT. STS-123 has five planned spacewalks and is led by mission commander Dominic Gorie. The bulk of the Japanese laboratory will be taken up to the ISS in late May aboard the shuttle Discovery, with the final components of the Kibō lab scheduled for launch next year.

American astronaut Garrett Reisman will be left on the ISS, where he will live and work until early June. He is set to replace European Space Agency astronaut Leopold Eyharts. The latter has been a resident of the space outpost since earlier this month and will return to Earth aboard Endeavour. Should the March 11 launch fail due to weather or technical glitches, NASA will try to launch Endeavour by March 23 in order to avoid conflicts with other planned launches later this year.

Even before the planned March 11 launch, another ship will be headed to the ISS, but will wait until Endeavour is back on Earth to dock with the Space Station. It's Jules Verne, the European Space Agency's first Automated Transfer Vehicle, which will launch from Kourou, French Guiana on March 7.