Hubble's Trouble

LETA

4☆babbler
Staff
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Image: NASA

The iconic space telescope responsible for giving us a glimpse of the universe since early 1990, suddenly stopped operating on June 13 of this year. Per mission control personnel, the main payload computer responsible for controlling and monitoring all the science instruments on the spacecraft went into shutdown mode without warning.

Attempts by NASA to restart the aging computer system built in the 80s failed on multiple occasions, prompting the space agency to switch to a telescope redundancy system, which also failed to respond.

As engineers scramble to pinpoint the cause of this catastrophic halt, system administrators are considering booting up a second backup payload computer installed in the last service mission back in 2009. In the meantime, all science instruments on the Hubble are in safe mode until the computer issues are dealt with.

Although NASA is confident it will be able to restore Hubble's operations, the legacy optical astronomy instrument has its days numbered. Soon, the James Webb Space Telescope (JWST) - which has a field of view about 15 times that of Hubble - will begin its observing run. Even if the JWST is not a Hubble replacement per se, 30 years of continuous space operations have taken their toll on good old Hubble, which at some point will be decommissioned by plunging back to Earth in one last blaze of glory.

 
What a shame to see it go up in flames. It provided some great images. Cant they donate it to another poorer country with a budding space program. Give it to India :)
 
By now, we should be able to retrieve these instruments from space and bring them back for an overhaul. Unfortunately, the black project vehicles with antigravity that could make this possible never see the light of day.
 
By now, we should be able to retrieve these instruments from space and bring them back for an overhaul. Unfortunately, the black project vehicles with antigravity that could make this possible never see the light of day.
Yes if us humans were not such a bunch of idiots how good could earth be if we all got along.
No need for secrets, everything shared.. Hey... Imagine there's no heaven..its easy if you try, no hell below........
Ummmm Where have I heard that before :)
 
I also don't believe in Santa Claus and the Easter Bunny,,,,,
psst..Leta...want to buy some swampland in Florida? ;)
 
Thats good its back up. The new ones going to be Awsome. Hubble produced amazing images. Nexf one should be awesome