The Hubble Space Telescope is returning to operation more than a month after its original payload computer shut down. NASA said it has successfully switched over to its backup computer — and while the process of bringing the system back online is slow, the agency has started to bring science instruments out of “safe mode.”
“There was cheering in the control center” on Thursday night when word came that NASA had managed to restore the payload computer, James Jeletic, Hubble’s deputy project manager, told NPR.
Hubble will likely resume science work this weekend
“There’s a big sense of relief,” Jeletic said.
“We believed that this all would work, but, you know, you’re dealing with the space business and all kinds of surprises can come your way. But we didn’t get any surprises.”
As for when the telescope will beam its first breathtaking images back to Earth since the restart, the wait should be a short one.
“The first observations will hopefully be done over the weekend,” Jeletic said. Accounting for the time it takes to receive and process the data, he predicted, “you probably would see the first images come out sometime in the beginning of next week.”
Troubleshooting a tech issue in orbit
The relief and joy comes more than a month after the space telescope stopped collecting images and other data on June 13 when the payload computer that controls its science instruments suddenly shut down. (The computer that runs the Hubble spacecraft remained online.)
For weeks, NASA scientists worked on possible solutions to bring the payload computer back, but none of those ideas worked.
Initial system tests struggled to isolate the problem — a process complicated by the hundreds of miles separating the Hubble team from the computer and other components. But as every system failure stubbornly remained, the team came to believe that only one glitch would account for such widespread problems: the power control unit, which sends electricity to all the hardware.
To work through the problem, the team studied schematics of the original designs that date back decades.
“We even had people come out of retirement who were experts in these areas on Hubble to help us,” Jeletic said.
The system’s successful restart, he added, “has a lot to say for the people who designed the spacecraft 40 years ago.”
Backup systems remain in place
Hubble’s scientific payload is running on its backup computer system, he said, because the team had already set it up to run on secondary units while working on the outage. It opted to stay on the backup system, Jeletic said, to simplify the restart process.
Hubble carries backups of all its components, part of the original engineers’ plans to cope with such problems. As of now, it’s down to just one power control unit. But the Hubble team also thinks there’s a chance the power unit might simply fix itself over time.
Outlining two ways that could happen, Jeletic said the unit may simply need to sit cold for a while to let electricity dissipate. There’s also a chance it failed due to “circuit drift,” he said, explaining that the circuit may have drifted out of its operational setting — and that it might simply drift back.
Exotic science relies on a 25 megahertz computer chip
The successful restart is just the latest comeback for Hubble, which was originally scheduled for only 15 years of service. It was placed into orbit in April 1990 after hitching a ride aboard the space shuttle Discovery.
Hubble’s main onboard computer is an Intel 486 computer whose 25 megahertz speed was the best available (and rated for space travel) when astronauts upgraded the system around the turn of the century.
“It has about 2 megabytes of memory,” Jeletic said. “So you can compare that to your latest iPhone. It’s very, very primitive by today’s standard of what you wear on your wrist, but it’s more than enough for what we need to do.”
Those components, which would be deemed vintage or simply obsolete in today’s computer market, are responsible for sending more than 1.5 million observations of nebulae, galaxies and star clusters back to Earth’s surface. And now that work will continue.
“Today, we still only use about 60[%] to 70% of its memory and its capacity to do all the things that Hubble does,” Jeletic said.
But Hubble is now in a situation many smartphone users may identify with: While tech support is still available, hardware support has been discontinued since NASA completed its final servicing mission in 2009.
Copyright 2021 NPR. To see more, visit https://www.npr.org.
NAIROBI, Kenya (AP) — The body of Ugandan Olympic athlete Rebecca Cheptegei — who died after being set on fire by her partner in Kenya — was received Friday by family and anti-femicide crusaders, ahead of her burial a day later.
Cheptegei’s family met with dozens of activists Friday who had marched to the Moi Teaching and Referral Hospital’s morgue in the western city of Eldoret while chanting anti-femicide slogans.
She is the fourth female athlete to have been killed by her partner in Kenya in yet another case of gender-based violence in recent years.
Viola Cheptoo, the founder of Tirop Angels – an organization that was formed in honor of athlete Agnes Tirop, who was stabbed to death in 2021, said stakeholders need to ensure this is the last death of an athlete due to gender-based violence.
“We are here to say that enough is enough, we are tired of burying our sisters due to GBV,” she said.
It was a somber mood at the morgue as athletes and family members viewed Cheptegei’s body which sustained 80% of burns after she was doused with gasoline by her partner Dickson Ndiema. Ndiema sustained 30% burns on his body and later succumbed.
Ndiema and Cheptegei were said to have quarreled over a piece of land that the athlete bought in Kenya, according to a report filed by the local chief.
Cheptegei competed in the women’s marathon at the Paris Olympics less than a month before the attack. She finished in 44th place.
Cheptegei’s father, Joseph, said that the body will make a brief stop at their home in the Endebess area before proceeding to Bukwo in eastern Uganda for a night vigil and burial on Saturday.
“We are in the final part of giving my daughter the last respect,” a visibly distraught Joseph said.
He told reporters last week that Ndiema was stalking and threatening Cheptegei and the family had informed police.
Four in 10 women or an estimated 41% of dating or married Kenyan women have experienced physical or sexual violence perpetrated by their current or most recent partner, according to the Kenya Demographic and Health Survey 2022.
TEL AVIV, Israel (AP) — A rare Bronze-Era jar accidentally smashed by a 4-year-old visiting a museum was back on display Wednesday after restoration experts were able to carefully piece the artifact back together.
Last month, a family from northern Israel was visiting the museum when their youngest son tipped over the jar, which smashed into pieces.
Alex Geller, the boy’s father, said his son — the youngest of three — is exceptionally curious, and that the moment he heard the crash, “please let that not be my child” was the first thought that raced through his head.
The jar has been on display at the Hecht Museum in Haifa for 35 years. It was one of the only containers of its size and from that period still complete when it was discovered.
The Bronze Age jar is one of many artifacts exhibited out in the open, part of the Hecht Museum’s vision of letting visitors explore history without glass barriers, said Inbal Rivlin, the director of the museum, which is associated with Haifa University in northern Israel.
It was likely used to hold wine or oil, and dates back to between 2200 and 1500 B.C.
Rivlin and the museum decided to turn the moment, which captured international attention, into a teaching moment, inviting the Geller family back for a special visit and hands-on activity to illustrate the restoration process.
Rivlin added that the incident provided a welcome distraction from the ongoing war in Gaza. “Well, he’s just a kid. So I think that somehow it touches the heart of the people in Israel and around the world,“ said Rivlin.
Roee Shafir, a restoration expert at the museum, said the repairs would be fairly simple, as the pieces were from a single, complete jar. Archaeologists often face the more daunting task of sifting through piles of shards from multiple objects and trying to piece them together.
Experts used 3D technology, hi-resolution videos, and special glue to painstakingly reconstruct the large jar.
Less than two weeks after it broke, the jar went back on display at the museum. The gluing process left small hairline cracks, and a few pieces are missing, but the jar’s impressive size remains.
The only noticeable difference in the exhibit was a new sign reading “please don’t touch.”
VICTORIA – The British Columbia government is partnering with a bear welfare group to reduce the number of bears being euthanized in the province.
Nicholas Scapillati, executive director of Grizzly Bear Foundation, said Monday that it comes after months-long discussions with the province on how to protect bears, with the goal to give the animals a “better and second chance at life in the wild.”
Scapillati said what’s exciting about the project is that the government is open to working with outside experts and the public.
“So, they’ll be working through Indigenous knowledge and scientific understanding, bringing in the latest techniques and training expertise from leading experts,” he said in an interview.
B.C. government data show conservation officers destroyed 603 black bears and 23 grizzly bears in 2023, while 154 black bears were killed by officers in the first six months of this year.
Scapillati said the group will publish a report with recommendations by next spring, while an independent oversight committee will be set up to review all bear encounters with conservation officers to provide advice to the government.
Environment Minister George Heyman said in a statement that they are looking for new ways to ensure conservation officers “have the trust of the communities they serve,” and the panel will make recommendations to enhance officer training and improve policies.
Lesley Fox, with the wildlife protection group The Fur-Bearers, said they’ve been calling for such a committee for decades.
“This move demonstrates the government is listening,” said Fox. “I suspect, because of the impending election, their listening skills are potentially a little sharper than they normally are.”
Fox said the partnership came from “a place of long frustration” as provincial conservation officers kill more than 500 black bears every year on average, and the public is “no longer tolerating this kind of approach.”
“I think that the conservation officer service and the B.C. government are aware they need to change, and certainly the public has been asking for it,” said Fox.
Fox said there’s a lot of optimism about the new partnership, but, as with any government, there will likely be a lot of red tape to get through.
“I think speed is going to be important, whether or not the committee has the ability to make change and make change relatively quickly without having to study an issue to death, ” said Fox.
This report by The Canadian Press was first published Sept. 9, 2024.
