The Hubble telescope is getting older, NASA announced this week that the hardware failures detected this last month cannot be repaired. The agency’s solution is to limit the use of instruments that continue to work to extend the life of this valuable telescope as much as possible, which has been working in space for 30 years, providing valuable information such as 1,000 new asteroids and impressive images of space.
Of the six gyroscopes that make up Hubble, only two work, so the agency will have to limit itself to using those two intermittently. Will switch the telescope to emergency mode with a single gyroscopekeeping the second in reserve for future use.
Since a month ago, The iconic observatory entered “safe mode” after anomalous readings were detected of one of the gyroscopes. These instruments help the rest of the team aim at the cosmic targets that the telescope is responsible for observing for scientists on Earth.
With a gyroscope
“Hubble has observed the universe for three decades and will continue to do so for years to come,” said Mark Clampin, director of the agency’s Astrophysics Division and the Science Mission Directorate at NASA Headquarters, during a news conference. press this afternoon. They hope to have the telescope operational again in mid-June.
This is not the first time Hubble has suffered from its gyroscopes; NASA astronauts replaced the gyroscopes several times on maintenance missions to the observatory, five of which took place between December 1993 and May 2009.
Usually, the control system responsible for aiming at targets uses three gyroscopes at the same time, while keeping others in reserve. Other sensors on board have even been used to replace a third gyroscope.
NASA assures that going from using two gyroscopes at the same time to using just one does not make a big difference in performance. Although Yes it will mean more time to move the equipment from one objective to another and you will lose some flexibility when observing some parts of the sky. “Operationally, we believe this is our best approach to supporting Hubble science over this decade and into the next, as most of the observations it makes will not be affected at all by this change,” Clampin said. .
Its final ending
However, this is not a possible ending. The fate of this legendary telescope seems to be similar to that of the ISS. By the mid-2030s, whether gyroscopes work or not, Hubble’s orbit will bring it closer to the Earth’s atmosphere where it will burn to death.
NASA has studied ways to boost Hubble’s orbit with SpaceX rockets, but no firm decision has been reached. “After exploring current commercial capabilities, we are not going to pursue new momentum at this time,” Clampin said.
