Space shuttle Enterprise piggybacks over Manhattan

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STORY: The space shuttle Enterprise flew to New York from Washington D.C. on Friday piggybacked atop a Boeing 747, making a dramatic flight along the Hudson River past the Statue of Liberty and then up the west side of Manhattan to the delight of observers.

En route to John F. Kennedy International Airport (JFK), the retired shuttle flew at low altitude along the river, giving residents of New York and New Jersey an extraordinary view of the craft.

After three decades, the United States retired its space shuttles last year after building the $100 billion (USD) International Space Station, a 15-nation project. It will begin work on a new generation of spaceships to carry astronauts beyond the station's 240-mile-high (384-km-high) orbit.

The Enterprise flight took off from Washington Dulles International Airport at about 9:30 a.m. EDT (1330 GMT). The flight was rescheduled from Wednesday (April 25) due to weather.

A prototype orbiter that was used for atmospheric test flights in the 1970s but never on a space mission, the Enterprise is scheduled later to be moved by barge up the Hudson for display at the Intrepid Sea, Air and Space Museum in Manhattan.

It will be lifted by crane onto the Intrepid, an aircraft carrier that has been a museum since 1982.