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Pair take spacewalk to fix telescope
Source: Agencies |
May 15, 2009, Friday
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Print Edition
A PAIR of spacewalking astronauts stepped outside yesterday to begin demanding repair work on the Hubble Space Telescope, a job made all the more dangerous because of the high, debris-ridden orbit.
John Grunsfeld and Andrew Feustel emerged from space shuttle Atlantis and quickly got started on their first job, a camera swap. The telescope - the size of a school bus - loomed over them.
"Ah, this is fantastic," Grunsfeld said as he floated out. "Woo-hoo," Feustel shouted.
It was the first of five high-risk spacewalks to fix Hubble's, install higher-tech science instruments and make the observatory more powerful than ever.
Atlantis and its crew are traveling in an especially high orbit, 560 kilometers above Earth, that is littered with pieces of smashed satellites.
A 10-centimeter piece of space junk passed within a couple miles of the shuttle Wednesday night, just hours after the shuttle grabbed Hubble. Even something that small could cause big damage.
Grunsfeld and Feustel first needed to remove a 15-year-old camera and then put in an updated model. Each is the size of a baby grand piano and awkward to handle.
Also on their to-do list: replacing a computer data unit that broke down last fall, and installing a docking ring so a robotic craft can guide the telescope into the Pacific years from now.
The new wide-field and planetary camera - worth US$132 million - will allow astronomers to peer deeper into the universe's past, to within 500 million to 600 million years of creation.
The old one coming out was installed in December 1993 during the first Hubble repair mission, to remedy the telescope's blurred vision.
It had corrective lenses already in place and, because of the astounding images it captured, quickly became known as the camera that saved Hubble.
Grunsfeld, the chief repairman with two previous Hubble missions under his work belt, took the lead on the camera replacement as well as the work to install a new science data-handling device.
The goal is to keep Hubble running for five to 10 years.
John Grunsfeld and Andrew Feustel emerged from space shuttle Atlantis and quickly got started on their first job, a camera swap. The telescope - the size of a school bus - loomed over them.
"Ah, this is fantastic," Grunsfeld said as he floated out. "Woo-hoo," Feustel shouted.
It was the first of five high-risk spacewalks to fix Hubble's, install higher-tech science instruments and make the observatory more powerful than ever.
Atlantis and its crew are traveling in an especially high orbit, 560 kilometers above Earth, that is littered with pieces of smashed satellites.
A 10-centimeter piece of space junk passed within a couple miles of the shuttle Wednesday night, just hours after the shuttle grabbed Hubble. Even something that small could cause big damage.
Grunsfeld and Feustel first needed to remove a 15-year-old camera and then put in an updated model. Each is the size of a baby grand piano and awkward to handle.
Also on their to-do list: replacing a computer data unit that broke down last fall, and installing a docking ring so a robotic craft can guide the telescope into the Pacific years from now.
The new wide-field and planetary camera - worth US$132 million - will allow astronomers to peer deeper into the universe's past, to within 500 million to 600 million years of creation.
The old one coming out was installed in December 1993 during the first Hubble repair mission, to remedy the telescope's blurred vision.
It had corrective lenses already in place and, because of the astounding images it captured, quickly became known as the camera that saved Hubble.
Grunsfeld, the chief repairman with two previous Hubble missions under his work belt, took the lead on the camera replacement as well as the work to install a new science data-handling device.
The goal is to keep Hubble running for five to 10 years.
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