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| An Ariane 5 lifts off Dec. 25 carrying NASA's James Webb Space Telescope. Credit: ESA/CNES/Arianespace |
Santiago, New Mexico— After a long-anticipated Dec. 25 launch, a space telescope that will see further into the cosmos than any other is on its journey to its goal beyond the moon.
At 7:20 a.m. EDT, an Ariane 5 blasted out from the Kourou spaceport in French Guiana. Rocket's top stage detached from James Webb Space Telescope 27 minutes after launch.
JWST's initial solar array deployment was verified by controllers within minutes of the 6,160-kilogram spacecraft's liftoff. The spacecraft's ability to produce electricity was made possible in large part because of the array of solar panels.
Arianespace CEO Stéphane Israel commented, "What we know today is that the injection was truly great" during a post-launch press conference on the launch of JWST. However, he emphasized that the rocket's performance will extend the life of JWST by lowering the amount of fuel it would need to adjust its trajectory, which would save money and resources.
After the launch, a long deployment and commissioning procedure for the telescope awaits, with several crucial phases needing to be completed. Generally speaking, the danger of a mission's launch is in the range of 80 percent." Thomas Zurbuchen, NASA associate administrator for science, remarked at a postlaunch conference that he "would think that it may be 20% of the danger, probably 30%" according to our study. "We've taken a lot of risk out of the equation, but there's still a lot of danger ahead of us that we're going to take down one step at a time."
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| JWST as seen from the upper stage of the Ariane 5 moments after separation. Credit: Arianespace |
A course correction maneuver known as MCC-1a will occur at 12.5 hours following liftoff. The spacecraft will arrive at the Earth-sun L-2 Lagrange point, 1.5 million kilometers from the Earth, 29 days after launch after completing the MCC-1a maneuver and a minor one named MCC-1b two days after liftoff.
JWST will undergo a series of deployments over the following two weeks, culminating in its final configuration. To ensure that the telescope and its components remain excellent enough for infrared observing, the sunshield will be deployed in the first week, which will be made up of five layers of Kapton material and the size of a tennis court. First and foremost, a 6.5-meter wide 18-segment primary mirror will be locked into position during this second week.
As a result of deployment efforts and any complications that may arise, project officials warned that that timeframe may vary in the weeks coming up to launch. JWST has 344 single-point failures, 80 percent of which are in the deployment systems. Still, authorities say they have a variety of ways to deal with any issues that arise throughout the mission's implementation.
A six-month commissioning phase will begin when the telescope is deployed, with scientists and engineers spending months adjusting the telescope's optics and, subsequently, its four instruments. In November, Bill Ochs, JWST project manager at NASA's Goddard Space Flight Center, remarked, "As the project manager, I won't breathe a sigh of relief until we proclaim ourselves operational 180 days after launch."
As soon as the $10 billion spacecraft is operational, astronomers will finally be able to take advantage of the years of delays and billions of dollars in cost overruns that have threatened the flagship astronomy project with cancellation.
With the help of the European Space Agency and Canadian Space Agency sensors, JWST will examine anything from planets in our solar system to the very early stages of galaxy formation. The study of stellar and galactic development and the characterization of exoplanets, especially those similar to Earth, are other important research priorities.
What are we going to do with this enormous telescope? Our goal is to view all there is in the cosmos that we are capable of seeing, according to Nobel laureate John Mather, the JWST lead project scientist at NASA Goddard.
Experts believe that JWST will finally be able to live up to the great expectations that have been placed on it. This is a once-in-a-lifetime event," NASA deputy administrator Pam Melroy stated during a news conference on Dec. 21. That said, this is a risky endeavor with a high reward rate. Everything we can think of has been done to make Webb successful, and now we simply need to go do it.
There have been "speed bumps, setbacks along the road," NASA Administrator Bill Nelson acknowledged at the meeting. "This space telescope has been decades in the making," he said. To carry out this kind of mission, only NASA and our partners can do so. More profound knowledge of our cosmos and our role in it will be gained via this research."
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