Hubble Telescope's Main Camera Shuts Down 131
anthemaniac writes "Space.com is reporting that the aging observatory's primary camera, the ACS, has been in safe mode since the weekend. From the article: 'An initial investigation indicates the camera has stopped functioning, and the input power feed to its Side B electronics package has failed.' The camera has shut down before and been revived."
this was obvious (Score:3, Insightful)
Personally I think they should boost it into higher orbit so it stays safe for future space archeologists. The same bods who will eventually be interested in retreiving the Viking missions, and who knows, if we get fast enough ships, the voyagers.
Re:What a huge POS (Score:4, Insightful)
China (Score:1, Insightful)
Aren't the optics the valuable part? (Score:2, Insightful)
We have a telescope in orbit that's servicable. It seems to me that the big, expensive part of this marvel would be the large optical reflector. Unless someone could point out a reason otherwise, would it not make sense to just keep making camera upgrades to put on the end of this thing? Yes, I realize that I may be oversimplying this procedure, but if it's not feasible to service it in the near future, is there something wrong with tucking it away in a safe orbit until it would become feasible...or clearly determine that the telescope has reached the end of its useful life and then de-orbit it?
Heck, if privatized, manned spaceflight is just around the corner, sell the silly thing to a private entity so they can fix it up and sell operating (viewing) time on it. Richard Branson and his ilk could have a field day with it.
Re:obligatory conspiracy post.... (Score:2, Insightful)
I'm pretty sure they were going to stop servicing it.
The question is: Will they come up with a replacement or try to fix the Hubble again?
And would be cost effective to repair it again or has it's time finally come?
Re:Funny? (Score:3, Insightful)
Eh? In case you're actually serious about this, (a) The US demonstrated ASAT capability over 20 years ago, and (b) ASAT capability is completely irrelevant, as such attacks don't deorbit the satellite, but result in tens of thousands of pieces [centerforspace.com] of debris that are dangerous to other satellites.
In any case, casting aspersions on NASA's ability based on Hubble is ridiculous, as it's been by any measure a spectacularly successful instrument, which even 17 years after launch has capabilities not matched by any foreseeable ground-based instruments (no, not even with adaptive optics) or by any planned space instrument.
Re:Aren't the optics the valuable part? (Score:2, Insightful)
Total HST cost: $6 billion [space.com]
Yearly HST operations budget: $337 million [nasa.gov]
Single servicing mission in 2008: $900 million [space.com]
I like Hubble a lot, but other missions [caltech.edu] which don't require (or allow) Shuttle service and cost on the order of $0.3-0.8 billion seem to me far more cost effective. The mirror is a tiny fraction of the cumulative operations costs.
Re:What a huge POS (Score:1, Insightful)