Hubble Space Telescope Anomaly Status Report

The HST tiger team continues their investigation of the Space Telescope Imaging Spectrograph (STIS) anomaly which caused it to suspend operations on July 6.

The team presented their status to the HST Project on July 20, and a recovery plan was approved.

The Hubble Space Telescope is pictured through an overhead window on the aft flight deck of the Earth-orbiting space shuttle Atlantis immediately prior to its release on flight day 9, May 19, 2009. Image Credit: NASA

On July 22, the team successfully recovered the STIS instrument and turned on its Charge-Coupled Device (CCD) detector. Science observations using the CCD are expected to resume by the end of the week. According to HST manager Ed Ruitberg, the CCD detector has a separate interface electronics unit and can be operated independently of the Multi-Anode Micro-channel Plate Array (MAMA) detectors on the STIS.

The HST tiger team is delaying a restart attempt of the STIS MAMA detectors until they complete their investigation of the Interface Electronics anomaly that was detected on July 6.