[HN Gopher] NASA returns Hubble to full science operations
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NASA returns Hubble to full science operations
Author : DamnInteresting
Score : 120 points
Date : 2021-12-07 21:18 UTC (1 hours ago)
(HTM) web link (www.nasa.gov)
(TXT) w3m dump (www.nasa.gov)
| keyle wrote:
| That warms my heart somehow, but I thought I had read that that
| was it for Hubble, like a year ago? Why the change of heart?
| Anyone got the full story, or did I cross my wires?
| pkaye wrote:
| There was some equipment failure last year. I think it was
| later diagnosed as a power control unit that failed.
| Fortunately there was a backup set they could switch to. Little
| by little parts are failing with time but they are nursing it
| along.
| croutonwagon wrote:
| I think one of the primary payload computers failed but they
| were able to flip to auxiliary/backup. That was in July though
|
| It's pretty much on borrowed time. I think they spent most of
| that outage trying to bring the main up and gave up.
|
| Must be fun troubleshooting something at like 400 km orbit.
| Heck I had to tell a lady she couldn't wfh today because her
| cell data tethering wasn't up to snuff to hold a connection to
| our vpn or do much of anything. She was seeing spurts of 10%
| loss on downstream and 200+ ms latency.
| scottyah wrote:
| Remembering what you did and what you wanted to do next takes
| a lot of notes! It's really amazing controlling the drones on
| Mars, with all the traffic routed through a constellation of
| satellites, where the rotation even affects the latency.
| skurtcastle wrote:
| That's awesome to hear.
|
| I'm excited for Dec 22nd when the James Webb launches. Crossing
| fingers big time.
| savant_penguin wrote:
| *if
| bryanlarsen wrote:
| 30 days off terror for it to transit and unfold. Scary times!
| for1nner wrote:
| Even longer for it to actually power up and start "working."
| Really excited for it, but feel like something akin to this
| hubble issue happening with the JW would be disastrous.
| mzkply wrote:
| It'll be a Starship mission with astronauts to go work on
| it at L2 in 2023/4 then.
| bduerst wrote:
| What's the timeline to being fully operational?
| chowells wrote:
| Roughly 6 months after launch for all systems to cool to
| operational temperature.
| pippy wrote:
| NASA could have built two or more as backups, as most of the
| cost was in R&D it would have been (comparably) cost
| effective to do so.
| teraflop wrote:
| If the R&D is done anyway, why not just wait and build a
| second telescope if the first one fails? I don't see why
| that would be any more expensive than building a backup
| ahead of time, and it means if the first one fails due to
| an undetected design flaw, they have a chance to correct
| it.
| xattt wrote:
| I'm looking forward for some of the photo series NASA probably
| has planned, like a simultaneous observation of the same object
| with Hubble and Webb.
| echelon wrote:
| The vibration incident was solved?
|
| This launch is going to be so scary as it represents the
| scientific promise and investments of a generation.
| wumpus wrote:
| The fixed fairing has been successfully launched twice.
| kingcharles wrote:
| Yeah, vibration turned out to be a non-issue, everything is
| go for launch.
| smingo wrote:
| Would Hubble be able to resolve Webb? Or vice versa?
| NikolaeVarius wrote:
| Webb doesn't cover all the capabilities of Hubble. Its a
| "successor" not a "replacement"
| phinnaeus wrote:
| "resolve" here means to see, as in, could Hubble take a photo
| of the JWT.
| wumpus wrote:
| Webb is at L2, so if it wants to look at Hubble in low Earth
| orbit, it's going to be pointing at the sun.
| sydthrowaway wrote:
| Can Hubble and JWST do simultaneous observation to extract more
| info of an object?
| onetwentythree wrote:
| Yes, that is being planned for, but I'm not sure if any cycle
| one proposals involve joint observations.
|
| https://jwst-docs.stsci.edu/jwst-opportunities-and-policies/...
| wumpus wrote:
| Sure, they're different telescopes with different instruments
| and different sensitivities.
| kunai wrote:
| One of NASA's biggest mistakes wrt the demise of the STS/Shuttle
| program was not leaving some way lined up to service Hubble in
| orbit. The current crop of launch vehicles isn't suited to this
| task, despite us being ten years out from STS-135.
|
| It's proven itself an absolutely invaluable tool for research,
| but I think the even more impressive mission Hubble has shown
| itself as irreplaceable for is stimulating the public's mind for
| science and exploration. There's nothing like seeing photos of
| the universe in visual-light spectrum and thinking, "what if we
| went there?"
|
| JWST is amazing and I'm so glad it's finally launching but for
| that second use case, it trails Hubble.
| duxup wrote:
| I thought the experience they had servicing Hubble actually
| meant that they generally didn't want to have satellites that
| they would have to service due to costs involved.
|
| Maybe with the new options it becomes cheaper/ more viable.
| scottyah wrote:
| I think JWST will be an amazing replacement as most space
| photos are doctored with visible light "interpretations" of
| other wavelengths already and nobody seems to notice/care as
| they have their minds blown. The process almost even adds to
| the beauty of them.
| inter_netuser wrote:
| collecting science?
| Causality1 wrote:
| The purpose of NASA is not only to explore but inspire. In light
| of that, I'd be fully supportive of using a Starship launch to
| bring Hubble home.
| melling wrote:
| To service and relaunch for the next 50 years?
| NikolaeVarius wrote:
| Museum
| pkaye wrote:
| If they could carry a larger payload, we could have a Hubble
| with a larger primary mirror. Some of the risks/costs of the
| JWST is all the folding mechanisms to fit the Ariane 5
| payload enclosure.
| gotstad wrote:
| That does not strike me as the right direction of
| progression. We should become better at in-space assembly,
| not creating larger payload fairing.
| ErikCorry wrote:
| Why not both?
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