The tensioning could take days. 🧐 engineering
, that were used to keep the sunshield safe and folded prior to deployment, had to work effectively for the sunshield to take shape. The
sunshield has now reached its full glorious 47-foot width, spanning all the way across the observatory. “The mid-booms are the sunshield’s workhorse and do the heavy lifting to unfold and pull the membranes into that now-iconic shape,” said Keith Parrish, Webb observatory manager at NASA’s Goddard Space Flight Center.
This means that over the next few days, the JWST can proceed to separate each of its five sunshield layers, creating space between the membranes to allow heat to radiate out, ensuring that each successive layer, beginning with the one closest to the Sun, can be cooler than the one below. This next phase of deployment is expected to last about two days.
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