CAPE CANAVERAL, Fla. Shuttle Endeavour and five astronauts raced toward the International Space Station Thursday after a stunning night launch on a mission aimed at mounting massive solar-power wings at the rapidly expanding outpost.

In what amounted to a controlled explosion, Endeavours three main engines and twin solid-fuel rocket boosters ignited at 10:06 p.m. Eastern Standard Time (Friday, 03:06 GMT), instantly propelling the 4.5 million-pound (2 million-kilogram) shuttle off the face of Earth.

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Rolling onto its back and arcing out over the Atlantic Ocean, the spaceship then blazed a brilliant trail through starry skies as the station cruised high above the southeastern Indian Ocean.

Shuttle cargo bay cameras will capture the action, and NASA mission managers expect to see some of the most spectacular footage ever beamed back from outer space.

"From a visual perspective, I think only Neil Armstrong stepping on the Moon is going to rival this," said NASA payload manager David Flowers.

Endeavour astronauts Carlos Noriega and Joe Tanner also will perform two other spacewalks, both of which will be broadcast live on SPACE.com.

The huge solar wings will be wired up to the station during an excursion set to begin at 1:06 p.m. EST (18:06 GMT) Tuesday.

The third walk which is scheduled to start at 12:06 p.m. EST (17:06 GMT) Thursday will involve setting up a device designed to gauge whether the king-sized solar wings will create a shock hazard for spacewalkers working outside the outpost.

Noriega and Tanner both will be wearing new "helmet-cams" during the spacewalks, giving armchair astronauts an unprecedented closeup look at the 13-story station.

"That should be a lot of fun to watch," said Glenda Laws, a lead engineer with NASAs spacewalk projects office at Johnson Space Center in Houston.

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NASAs 101st shuttle flight, however, almost didnt get off the ground Thursday.

First, shuttle fuel-loading operations were put on hold after inspectors spotted a loose bracket on a sprinkler system water line located at the 195-foot (59-meter) level of Endeavours launch tower.

Technicians armed with crescent wrenches and hacksaws rushed out to the pad and boarded a crane-lifted cherry picker to remove the dangling bracket, which could have flown free during launch, damaging the leading edge of the shuttles left wing.

Fragile thermal panels on that crucial part of the wing play a key role in protecting shuttles and their crews from searing temperatures the ships are exposed to during atmospheric reentry.

A breach in those panels, consequently, could prove deadly.

The removal of the bracket and the replacement of another was finished up in time to start gassing up the shuttles 15-story external tank at 2:51 p.m. EST (19:51 GMT), or 39 minutes before NASA would have been forced to cancel the launch attempt.

It takes three hours to pump 528,000 gallons (2 million liters) of liquid hydrogen and liquid oxygen into the shuttles bullet-shaped fuel reservoir, and the hurry-up repair job had to be completed by 3:30 p.m. EST (20:30 GMT) to top off Endeavour's tanks in time for launch.

The bracket scramble was followed by a potentially dangerous situation.

Less than a half-hour after Endeavours huge propellant tank was filled, a small brush fire erupted between the shuttle and a nearby fuel storage tank.

The blaze likely was sparked when flames shooting out of a flare stack designed to burn off excess hydrogen gases at the pad ignited airborne particulates that then fell to the ground.

A tanker truck and a fire crew were dispatched to douse the fire before the astronauts headed to the launch tower. The job took a little less than a half-hour and NASA officials said neither the shuttle nor the pad equipment was endangered.

"It was not a problem to put it out," a firefighter told NASA launch controllers.

The remainder of the countdown went fairly smooth and then Endeavour thundered aloft, lighting up the night sky as thousands of central Florida residents and tourists watched on from nearby roadsides and beaches.

Riding atop a 60-story pillar of flame, the soaring shuttle morphed into a fast moving "star" that was visible along most of Americas southeastern seaboard. Nine minutes into flight, Endeavour slipped into its initial orbit, hot on the trail of the growing station.

A relatively small two-roomer when its first two building blocks were linked in orbit in late 1998, the station during the past five months has been expanding in fast fashion.

Long-awaited Russian crew quarters were lofted in mid July and outfitted by a visiting shuttle crew in September. A month later, the first piece of the stations metal backbone and a new shuttle docking port were added during a complicated construction mission.

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Shepherd and company took up residence at the outpost Nov. 2 and have been busy setting up shop since then.

The outpost trio was in the midst of an eight-hour sleep period when Endeavour blasted off, trailing the station by 8,625 miles (13,800 kilometers). Thats not to say that Shepherd and his crew mates arent anxious to see the shuttle astronauts arrive with the stations new solar wings.

Existing electrical power supplies now are so meager that one of the stations three pressurized wings is off limits to the outpost crew because it cannot be heated.

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Capable of generating enough electricity to supply 30 homes on Earth, the new solar panels will provide enough power to open the so-called Unity module, the most expansive of the cylindrical rooms which make up the 80-ton complex.

"Send our wishes for a successful launch to the [shuttle] crew," Krikalev told NASA ground controllers before the outpost residents retired for the night.

Now scheduled to be capped with a Dec. 11 landing here at Kennedy Space Center, the Endeavour mission also promises to pave the way to the planned mid January launch of the U.S. Destiny lab -- a bus-sized module that will serve as the scientific heart of the outpost.

A flurry of 38 more U.S. shuttle and Russian rocket missions then are planned through April 2006 to complete construction of the station, which eventually will weigh 480 tons and span an area as big as two American football fields set side by side.

Another 39 Russian rocket missions also will be required during that time to haul fuel, supplies and crew transport ships to the station. "If you sit back and look at it, these are really exciting and challenging times," said NASA shuttle program manager Ron Dittemore.

"Were going to continue to build this space station over the coming months," added senior NASA project manager Bob Cabana. "And although its an awesome facility right now, by this time next year, it will truly be a functioning space station doing real science up there on a regular basis."