Herschel Space Observatory, ESA |
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Herschel Space Observatory, ESA |
 May 14 2009, 06:04 PM
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#46
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 Interplanetary Dumpster Diver  Group: Moderator Posts: 4061 Joined: 17-February 04 From: Powell, TN Member No.: 33  |
Happy day for space-borne astronomy!
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| Guest_PhilCo126_* |
 May 14 2009, 06:40 PM
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#47
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Guests |
Indeed Ted, fingers crossed the trip to L2 point goes well... Amazing to see how, from a launch vehicle weighing 777 Tons, about 5.5 Tons will make a great difference for space borne astronomy
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May 14 2009, 08:30 PM
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#48
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Senior Member Group: Members Posts: 1106 Joined: 14-October 05 From: Seattle Member No.: 530 |
QUOTE (SFJCody @ May 14 2009, 11:50 AM)  It's great isn't it! I remember how much jeering there was after the unfortunate failure of the maiden launch carrying Cluster. They're not laughing now! Well, the schadenfreude probably had more to do with the hubris of putting a payload on the maiden launch, and the spectacular nature of the failure, than it had to do with failure itself being unusual, or with people finding anything to jeer about watching a valuable payload disappear. Yes, it may not have been unprecedented to launch a payload on a first flight, but in hindsight it certainly didn't look prudent. I don't think that people necessarily expected the failures to continue. Fair characterization or not, it sort of would be like Boeing inviting a few VIPs onto the 787's first flight and having it crash. The crash is bad, but having an important payload on it compounded it. I guess it wasn't irreplacable. If it were the US, it'd have been some "spare" huge recon sat. |
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May 14 2009, 09:14 PM
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#49
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 Member Group: Members Posts: 107 Joined: 18-July 05 Member No.: 438 |
As someone whose research post disappeared in an admittedly very pretty puff of smoke in 1996, I agree that it wasn't very prudent to put Cluster on that particular launcher! One important part of the decision to do so was the very economical price of the launch, but clearly it was a false economy.
It was very galling to discover the very avoidable cause of the loss, and then to take delivery of the returned, dented, mud-covered instruments a few weeks later. Valuable lessons were learnt that will hopefully help prevent anything similar happening again. Cluster II has of course been a huge success, and is still going strong... |
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May 14 2009, 09:25 PM
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#50
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 Senior Member Group: Members Posts: 3538 Joined: 1-October 05 From: Croatia Member No.: 523 |
QUOTE (ynyralmaen @ May 14 2009, 11:14 PM) I agree that it wasn't very prudent to put Cluster on that particular launcher! That's hindsight and it's easy to make conclusions now. I'd argue it was as prudent a decision back then as it would be now. The Cluster team had to be aware of the risks involved in the decision to fly on a new and untested vehicle and they still went ahead with it. It doesn't really matter how stupid or avoidable a failure is in retrospect, it's always those unknowns that get you. Hopefully you learn something from your mistakes along the way. -------------------- |
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May 14 2009, 09:42 PM
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#51
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 Senior Member Group: Moderator Posts: 6501 Joined: 8-December 05 From: Los Angeles Member No.: 602 |
Belated congrats to ESA & our European friends on the successful launch! Naturally, I was at the doctor all morning & missed it.
-------------------- A few will take this knowledge and use this power of a dream realized as a force for change, an impetus for further discovery to make less ancient dreams real.
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May 15 2009, 01:35 PM
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#52
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Senior Member Group: Members Posts: 3538 Joined: 1-October 05 From: Croatia Member No.: 523 |
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May 15 2009, 03:37 PM
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#53
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Senior Member Group: Members Posts: 1106 Joined: 14-October 05 From: Seattle Member No.: 530 |
Herschel has a VMC? Full globe images!
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May 15 2009, 07:23 PM
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#54
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 Administrator Group: Chairman Posts: 13269 Joined: 8-February 04 Member No.: 1 |
I hope ESOC can muscle their way in to get a few VMC images in there during cruise.
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May 15 2009, 09:53 PM
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#55
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 Director of Galilean Photography Group: Members Posts: 709 Joined: 15-July 04 From: Austin, TX Member No.: 93 |
Wouldn't any such pictures of the Earth be blinded by the Sun? I thought Herschel was supposed to go to L2, right? Now, we could get some potentially nice pictures of the moon, but the viewing angle on that camera looked fairly wide.
-------------------- Space Enthusiast Richard Hendricks
-- "The engineers, as usual, made a tremendous fuss. Again as usual, they did the job in half the time they had dismissed as being absolutely impossible." --Rescue Party, Arthur C Clarke Mother Nature is the final inspector of all quality. |
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Jun 19 2009, 11:57 AM
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#56
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 Special Cookie Group: Members Posts: 2149 Joined: 6-April 05 From: Sintra | Portugal Member No.: 228 |
-------------------- "Ride, boldly ride," The shade replied, "If you seek for Eldorado!"
Edgar Alan Poe |
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Jun 19 2009, 12:49 PM
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#57
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Forum Contributor Group: Members Posts: 906 Joined: 8-February 04 From: North East Florida, USA. Member No.: 11 |
Very nice. Big mirrors in space
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Jul 10 2009, 10:15 AM
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#58
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 The Poet Dude Group: Moderator Posts: 5548 Joined: 15-March 04 From: Kendal, Cumbria, UK Member No.: 60 |
.. and we have pictures...
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/sci/tech/8143447.stm .. and... http://herschel.esac.esa.int/FirstLight.shtml
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Oct 8 2009, 01:21 PM
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#59
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Newbie Group: Members Posts: 3 Joined: 2-October 09 From: Seattle, WA Member No.: 4961 |
Hi !
I've been reading UMSF for some time... and I couldn't resist posting this http://herschel.esac.esa.int/FirstParallelModeImages.shtml First observations of our Milky Way in SPIRE/PACS parallel mode reveal cold material structures with unprecedented detail. |
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Oct 18 2009, 05:13 PM
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#60
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 Senior Member Group: Members Posts: 2253 Joined: 15-January 05 From: center Italy Member No.: 150 |
QUOTE (Thomas Lesinski @ Oct 8 2009, 01:21 PM) First observations of our Milky Way in SPIRE/PACS parallel mode reveal cold material structures with unprecedented detail. Beautiful image but seems a little blurry, sharpened version reveal lot of details indeed!
Attached thumbnail(s)
-------------------- - Marco -
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