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Science NASA announces major delay in Hubble repair mission
Science NASA announces major delay in Hubble repair mission | NASA announces major delay in Hubble repair mission |
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| by William Atkins | |
| Wednesday, 01 October 2008 | |
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Page 3 of 3 NASA thinks that Side A could have failed due to its extended length of service and its high exposure to radiation in space. Featured Whitepaper
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Science DiscussionsTherefore, NASA is considering replacing the failed Side A with a replacement system during the now-delayed STS-125 mission to repair HST. As it stands now, the October 14, 2008 mission of the STS-125 crew, onboard space shuttle Atlantis, has been postponed until sometime in early 2009, but not before mid-February 2009 and possibly as late as April 2009. Tentative plans are to have the STS-125 astronauts deliver and install a new Science Instrument Command and Data Handling (SICDH) system to Hubble. NASA states that a spare system is available at the Goddard Space Flight Center (Greenbelt, Maryland). It will need to be extensively tested and upgraded, however, because it has not been turned on since 2001. In addition, the astronauts will need to be trained in order to know how to remove the old unit and replace it with the new one. NASA spokesperson Michael Curie states, “The teams are always looking at contingencies, and this is just something that has cropped up we have the ability to deal with. They're just trying to decide what direction we want to go.” [SignOnSanDiego.com: “NASA delays repair mission to Hubble telescope ”] NASA also states that the Hubble Space Telescope is not in danger. Its telescope is still operational—only this one computer has failed so it is unable to transmit data back to Earth. So, until NASA can repair Hubble, either from the ground with the backup Side B or by replacing the entire unit during the next HST repair mission, we will not be receiving any more dramatic images of the universe. |
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