It has been an iconic sight for decades, but today a Nasa space shuttle blasted into the night sky for the last time - with a British-born astronaut on board.

The Endeavour shuttle left Cape Canaveral in Florida early this morning carrying six astronauts and a payload of new equipment for the International Space Station.

The space shuttle reached orbit before dawn, igniting the sky with a familiar flash of light. Thick, low clouds that had delayed a first launch attempt on Sunday returned, but cleared away just in time for the launch.

“Looks like the weather came together tonight,” launch director Mike Leinbach told the astronauts as they prepared for lift-off. “It’s time to go fly.”

George Zamka, the flight commander, replied: “We’ll see you in a couple weeks.”

Among the crew was Dr Nicholas Patrick, 45, originally from Saltburn-by-the-Sea, North Yorkshire.

Dr Patrick is part of a small band of British-born astronauts to have made it into space.

In 2006 he was part of a seven-member Discovery crew that blasted off for a 12-day mission to the International Space Station.

Married with three children, Dr Patrick now lives in Connecticut.

There are just four more shuttle missions scheduled this year before the famous ships are retired. “For the last night launch, it treated us well,” Mr Leinbach said.

There currently are no American vehicles to replace the shuttles, which began flying in 1981. For the near future, Nasa is buying transportation flights to the space station from Russia, which charges $50 million per seat on its Soyuz capsules.

Nasa had been working on developing its own capsule called Orion that could travel to the moon as well as the space station, but with costs outpacing available funds, the Obama administration last week proposed cancelling the programme.

Instead, Nasa would spend $6 billion over the next five years to help private companies develop space taxis.

Endeavour is scheduled to reach the station on Wednesday for a nine-day stay. During which time the astronauts will help install a new room and observation deck.

Mr Zamka and his crew will deliver and build Tranquillity, the new room that will eventually house life-support equipment, exercise machines and a toilet, as well as a seven-windowed dome. The lookout has the biggest window ever sent into space, a circle 31 inches (79 centimetres) across.

This will be the last major construction job at the space station. The room and dome, supplied by the European Space Agency, are the final major pieces of the jigsaw to be constructed at the station.

Mike Moses, the Endeavour launch manager said he had received “evil glares” in the control centre for forcing his team report for duty yesterday - on Super Bowl night.

He pointed out that the shuttle’s fuel tank was made in New Orleans – the home of last night victorious American Football team. “They were at least happy with the results of the game,” he said.

The early morning countdown ran smoothly, except for a last-minute sprint to the launch pad by an official. Stephen Robinson, one of the astronauts had forgotten the binder holding all his flight data files.

Within 15 minutes of taking off, the astronauts were enjoying “a beautiful sunrise” from orbit, with the moon as a backdrop. “Wish you could be here,” Mr Zamka called down.

The four remaining shuttle flights to the station, in March, May, July and September, have daytime departures, although a significant delay could bump any of the launches into darkness.

Given all the changes coming, the mood around the launching site was bittersweet.

The manager in charge of preparing Endeavour for launch, Dana Hutcherson, said everyone was excited to be part of the first launch of the new year. “But let’s face it, our team is going to have a challenging year ahead of us as the space shuttle is ending,” she said. “It’s not going to be easy for us.”