 |
 |
||
 |
|
||
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
||||||||
|
The Planetary Society BlogBy Emily LakdawallaNASA's Final Servicing Mission to the Hubble Space TelescopeMay. 7, 2009 | 15:09 PDT | 22:09 UTC
Planetary Society volunteer Ken Kremer is reporting for us from the Kennedy Space Center, where he is anticipating the launch of Space Shuttle Atlantis to the Hubble Space Telescope on May 11. Kremer is a research scientist and freelance journalist who spends his spare time giving public outreach presentations on behalf of The Planetary Society as a volunteer and NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory as a Solar System Ambassador. He also enjoys creating Mars mosaics. Thanks Ken!  by Ken Kremer
First, let me please wish Emily and family all the best on the birth of her second child, the most precious gift imaginable. And thank you to all at The Planetary Society for the opportunity to guest blog from the Kennedy Space Center press center and launch facilities on the imminent and exciting shuttle flight to Hubble. Previously it was my privilege to report to you all on the successful blast off of the Dawn Asteroid Orbiter in September 2007 and which recently flew past Mars, my favorite planet, for a gravity assisted boost towards Vesta. The final Space Shuttle flight to NASA's orbiting Hubble Space Telescope is set for blast off on May 11 at 2:01PM EDT from Launch Pad 39 A at the Kennedy Space Center in Florida. This will be NASA's 5th and final shuttle mission to service and upgrade Hubble. The stakes could not be higher for this action packed, dauntingly complex and long delayed mission. It's certain to be "High drama at the High Frontier" for this flight designated as SM-4 (Servicing Mission 4). Hubble has suffered "significant deterioration" in its science capabilities since the last servicing mission (SM-3B) conducted in March 2002, according to Ed Weiler, associate administrator of NASA's Science Mission Directorate in Washington, DC. The seven year gap between servicing missions is "twice what it should be", says David Leckrone, Hubble project scientist at NASA Goddard in Greenbelt, MD. "We need surgery to get back to 100%". On average NASA dispatched servicing missions to Hubble at roughly three year intervals. The long delay is a direct consequence of the destruction of Space Shuttle Columbia on re-entry in February 2003 and the death of the entire seven person crew of men and women. Indeed this final servicing mission was outright cancelled in 2004 as "too risky" by then NASA Administrator Sean O'Keefe in the wake of the Columbia tragedy. The subsequent NASA Administrator Mike Griffin reinstated the mission in 2006 after exhaustive further analysis and development of a new plan which includes simultaneously placing a back-up shuttle on Launch Pad 39 B if required to mount a quick response ‘launch on need' rescue mission.
The overriding goal plain and simple for the SM-4 astronaut crew launching aboard the Space Shuttle Atlantis is to save Hubble from near term death and extend the operational science gathering lifespan by around 5 years to about 2014 and perhaps even a few years longer if critical components continue to function says Preston Burch, Hubble Program manager at NASA Goddard. NASA hopes for some overlap in operations with Hubble's successor, the James Webb Space Telescope (JWST) set for launch on 2013. Hubble has set "A Standard of Excellence" says Ed Weiler since the first servicing mission (SM-1) in 1993 when astronauts installed new instruments and corrective optics for the flawed primary mirror. Now however, "Hubble currently has only 3 working science channels. The Wide Field Planetary Camera 2 (WFPC-2) is 15 years old and getting a little bit long on the tooth and will be replaced on this mission" adds David Leckrone. After SM-4, Hubble will have 14 channels, 11 of them new. Weiler stated that if all goes well, "Hubble will be at the apex of its science capabilities and will never have been better". During the scheduled 11 day flight, four highly trained astronauts will conduct 5 back-to-back spacewalks (or EVAs) in a bold attempt to repair, refurbish, and replace science instruments and vital equipment to ensure that Hubble is at the cutting edge of science discoveries into the next decade. The mission will put in place state-of-the-art technology that improves the telescopes discovery power by 10 to 70 times. Astronauts will install two new science instruments and repair two inactive ones, install new thermal insulation blankets and batteries, replace all 6 gyroscopes, perform maintenance on critical subsystems and components and attach a docking mechanism for a potential future de-orbit mission or Orion capsule docking. The result will be six working, complementary science instruments with discovery capabilities far beyond what is now available and that will contribute significantly to the expansion of human knowledge. The seven member astronaut crew for STS-125 is a mix of veterans and first time space flyers for what will be the 126th shuttle flight. Indeed, three of the astronauts flew together on the last Hubble servicing mission including repeat Shuttle Commander Scott Altman, lead space walker John Grunsfeld (an astronomer on his 3rd trip to Hubble), and fellow Hubble spacewalker Mike Massimino. This will be the first spaceflight for Shuttle pilot Gregory Johnson and Mission Specialist Megan McArthur who's job is to grab Hubble with the robotic arm on Flight Day 3 and berth it safely and securely in the cavernous shuttle cargo bay. Rookie Mission Specialists Michael Good and Andrew Feustel round out the team of 4 spacewalkers who will work in alternating teams of two. SM-4 blast-off was suddenly postponed from last October 2008 when a circuit in the crucial data handling unit which commands and controls all the science instruments and communications relay unexpectedly failed barely two weeks prior to blast-off. Due to the ensuing lengthy launch delay NASA officials opted to destack the shuttle components and I was fortunate to be on hand and photograph the rollback of Atlantis off Launch Pad 39 A and back into the Vehicle Assembly Building (VAB).
Hubble cannot function without the data unit known as the Science Instrument Command & Data Handling Unit (SIC &DH). Luckily the team was able to switch Hubble operations over to the built in back-up redundant "B" side command unit. In fact as Ed Weiler pointed out, it was quite fortunate that the unit malfunction occurred before the launch attempt or the entire repair effort could have been for naught. This allowed the team to check and certify a partially disassembled ground spare SIC &DH unit which actually had never been flight qualified. And it has taken a Herculean effort by all involved to conduct performance testing and get the data handling unit ready and primed for installation on this mission as one of the top priority goals. NASA managers gave the ‘Go' for STS-125 launch following the customary Flight Readiness Review (FRR) last week on April 30 after assessing the risks of the mission and determining that the shuttle's equipment and support systems are ready for flight. The back-up shuttle Endeavour sits on standby at Pad 39 B ready to fly within about a week in the unlikely event an emergency rescue mission is necessary due to irreparable damage to the heat shield tiles or other problems. Atlantis cannot fly to the International Space Station as a ‘safe haven' for the human crew and has limited life sustaining supplies. With Atlantis lift off now just 4 days away, launch and training preparations are in their final stages and the crew has entered the standard pre-launch quarantine. The crew is scheduled to arrive in Florida on Friday afternoon May 8 and the launch countdown begins at 4 PM, events which I hope to report on.
Post this page to:
CommentsThis comment form is powered by GentleSource Comment Script. It can be included in PHP or HTML files and allows visitors to leave comments on the website.
|
||||||
 |
 |
||||||
Copyright © 1993 – 2010 The Planetary Society. All rights reserved.
Privacy Policy | Contact Us | Society Updates
[ what is this? ]
[ what is this? ]