The James Webb Space Telescope, which launched on Christmas day, is in the process of deploying its sunshield. If anything goes wrong, it could endanger its mission to observe the early universe
After a nail-biting launch on Christmas Day, theThe JWST blasted off from French Guiana at 12:20 GMT on 25 December on top of an Ariane 5 rocket
Its next big manoeuvres were two course-correction burns, firing rocket thrusters to nudge the JWST towards its correct orbit around the sun, at a gravitationally stable location called L2 about 1.5 million kilometres from Earth.The two burns used less fuel than anticipated thanks to the accuracy of the Ariane 5 rocket, which means the JWST will have enough propellant to last “significantly” longer than its expected 10-year operation time, according to NASA engineers.
As this article was published, the first three layers had been deployed and tightened and the rest of the sunshield is expected to be tensioned today. However, the sequence could take longer depending on the data that the JWST’s engineers receive on the ground.
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