Cassini Can See Cleary Now

EccentricAnomaly writes: "Well, it looks like Cassini's camera problems have been fixed according this story at CNN and this Cassini mission status report. The haze first appeared on the camera lens somewhere between Jupiter and Saturn. Personally, I can't stand it when I get crud on my windshield -- especially when I'm 750 million miles from home."

Cute

[ObviousGuy]

They hit the defroster.

Now back to taking purty pictures.

Re:Proof that Cassini can see Cleary now,.

[mmaddox]

I was hoping this was Beverly Cleary [beverlycleary.com]. I want another Mouse and the Motorcycle book.

Awesome!

[tswinzig]

Now only if you could type clearly as well.

cleary

[EccentricAnomaly]

I accidentally hit sumbit insted od preveiw. I was hoping someone would cetch mi mistakek and fix the spelling.

Cassini, and it's headlines, inside story history

[EvilBastard]

Page 1 : PLUTONIUM POWERED PROBE COULD KILL BILLIONS IF EXPLODED ON TAKEOFF
Page 7 : It didn't.

Page 1 : EARTH COULD BE HIT BY PLUTONIUM PROBE FLYBY AND KILL EVERYONE
Page 9 : Missed us.

Page 1 : BILLION DOLLAR PLUTONIUM PROBE BLINDED
Page 11 : We fixed it.

Re:Cassini, and it's headlines, inside story histo

[JetScootr]

Concerning the "Plutonium power supply":http://spacelink.nasa.gov/NASA.Projects/Hu man.Exploration.and.Development.of.Space/Human.Spa ce.Flight/Shuttle/Shuttle.Missions/Flight.031.STS- 34/Galileos.Power.Supply/RTG.Fact.Sheet
Sorry for the long URL.
This documents the history of Radioisotope Thermalelectric Generators, including accidents (Such as Apollo 13) in which the RTG has actually been splashed. In one case, the RTG was recovered and its fuel reused.

Re:Cassini, and it's headlines, inside story histo

[JetScootr]

See if you can patch together the URL in my earlier post (it's a mess- sorry) But it is for an actual NASA report on Galilleo and describes RTG fuel recovered from a weather satellite that actually did go blooey during launch. Fact is, those pellets are designed to withstand actual detonation of the entire launch vehicle with at most fracturing. They won't "vaporize" as the media likes to fret over. This stuff is as hard as steel balls in a steel vault - even a LOX cato won't turn it into confectioner's sugar. Actual experience has shown that these things really are tougher than the "black boxes" they use in commericial airliners.

Re:Cassini, and it's headlines, inside story histo

[Observer]

Actually, even better. For "We fixed it", read "We thought of this in advance and our solution worked".

(From the mission update referenced in the story, the camera had built-in heaters to warm up the lenses in anticipation of this very problem, since warming the instruments had worked on previous missions. So the comment that suggested windscreen wipers wasn't totally off-beam....)

Nice pics

[AstroMage]

To appreciate the nice pictures taken by Cassini, check out its website gallery [nasa.gov]. I especially liked the artwork section [nasa.gov]. While nor real pictures, they are still very nice... :-)

Why Not Windshield Wipers?

[gdyas]

I know it sounds like a dumb joke, but really -- why not a set of high-tech, NASA-designed windshield wipers for when stuff like this happens again to the optics on a satellite?

Other satellites are sure to run into interstellar crud in the future, so they could possibly have a lens-cleaning apparatus as well as a lens cover, like for Hubble.

I'm sure some engineer up there has already thought of this but I'd figure I'd toss it out there.

Re:Why Not Windshield Wipers?

[CheshireCatCO]

The reason why not? Moving parts. There is a taboo on moving parts, in as far as they can be avoided. Moving parts can jam in the most inconvient places, rendering an instrument useless. In this case, if a wiper got caught midwipe, all the subsequent pictures would have that wiper in the middle of the image. Sort of like fingers in vacation photos, but way more expensive.

Re:Why Not Windshield Wipers?

[esonik]

1) It would destroy the optics. You would get scratches and the finish (anti-reflection coating and such) would also be scratched away. Basically you don't want any mechanical contact with optics.

2) There's no space for wipers when the condensate is somewhere within the lens system and you would need a seperate wiper for each surface.

3) The surfaces of optics are not flat but probably spheric or have some different form. It would be difficult to build a wiper for that geometry.

Re:Why Not Windshield Wipers?

[esonik]

I forgot one point:
4) If you have moving parts they will release tiny particles when they move due to friction (and you have a lot of friction in vacuum), causing more problems. Keep in mind that there is no gravity forcing those particles down, so they would fly around and not necessarily adsorb on the surface to be wiped away.

Re:Why Not Windshield Wipers?

[Observer]

OK, I should have responded here instead of to the "Headlines" post.

NASA anticipated the problem - see the paragraph about lens heaters in the mission update referenced in the story.

Not quite windshield wipers, granted, but the agency did anticipate the problem from ealier experience, and built in a solution that had worked before and which worked this time, too.