[X] My Assistant

[cIclops]

An overlooked mission yet one that will be the focus of media attention in 155 days from now on July 4 2005, so there's time left to post a message before impact

cIc

[Decepticon]

Does annyone know if DI has any plans after primary mission?

Waste of a probe if its not used for anything else.

[cIclops]

Good question. After data playback DI will be a fully functioning spacecraft with nowhere to go. It has two telescopes (30cm and 12cms diameter) a multispectral camera and an infrared spectrometer. There should also be some of the original 86kg of fuel left after trajectory corrections.

There is an undefined period between EOM and EOP where something may happen such as navigation tests. Retargeting to another object followed by hibernation may be possible.

There is very little or no money as, according to this story the project has overspent (from $279M to $313M) and been descoped (one year earth orbit test phase cancelled) so an extended mission will need more funding.

Impact: 4 July 2005
End of Mission: 3 August 2005
End of Project: April 2006

http://www.nasa.gov/deepimpact
http://deepimpact.umd.edu/
http://deepimpact.jpl.nasa.gov/

152 days to impact

[tedstryk]

I have heard talk about trying to send it to at least one more comet. If funded and if it has enough fuel, maybe it will be able to somewhat make up for Contour.

[djellison]

I'm sure it'll get that funding - a pre launch press conf mentioned that they have several follow-on candidate targets.

Of course - the spacecraft may get damanged during the flypast, who knows.

I think they're planning to use Genesis for training, and to measure some solar wind features as well - if nothing else, DI could be used for that.

DI will only be 6 months old when it's primary mission is over. For most spacecraft, they've barely finished checkout and have 8 years ahead of them at that stage

Doug

[tedstryk]

Lets hope DI has 8 years to explore many comets!

[Decepticon]

Looks like great news!

Thanks for the updates.

[djellison]

I wonder if DI's done any Earht Observations as a calibration exercise as it was leaving
?

Doug

[tedstryk]

I remember reading it would. But whether it will be Mariner 10 quality or Rosetta quality or somewhere inbetween is unkown.

[DEChengst]

I wonder if DI's done any Earht Observations as a calibration exercise as it was leaving.

Deep Impact went into safe mode shortly after launch, so that means no science observations.

[djellison]

They recovered from that safing very quickly - and I would have thought some calib.type stuff would have been maybe 5, 10 days out ( a couple of lunar distances ) and would have been unaffeected.

Doug

[cIclops]

There is a neat DI simulator available at http://neo.jpl.nasa.gov/orbits/deepimpact.html
(requires Java) that will trace the trajectory all the way through to impact on July 4 2005.

The simulator will also run forward until 14 February 2008 and show close encounters between DI and both Mars and Earth. It's not clear if these encounters are based on the trajectory changes that will be made just before encountering Tempel 1. The simulator does warn that it uses 2 body methods and is not accurate over longer timescales.

Further to Decepticon's question about plans after encounter, in the second to last paragraph on that page it says:

"If the spacecraft is healthy and if NASA is able to grant the necessary permission and resources, the spacecraft could then be re-targeted for another cometary flyby by using the Earth encounter to re-shape the spacecraft's trajectory."

There is also a project outreach page about observing Tempel 1 and the impact here: http://deepimpact.umd.edu/amateur/index.shtml

146 days to impact

[cIclops]

1st trajectory correction maneuver (TCM) performed successfully on 11 February 2005.

Coming up: scientific calibrations, an encounter demonstration test, ground operational readiness checks and a second TCM.

http://www.nasa.gov/mission_pages/deepimpact/main/index.html


141 days to impact

[Guest_BruceMoomaw_*]

(1) The DI people have been considering a follow-up comet flyby almost from the start, and two possible targets have been identified. One is Comet Finlay, but I don't know what the other one is.

(2) DI did indeed take some calibration photos of the Moon shortly after leaving Earth, and one has been released. It looks -- unlike the fuzzy misted-up Stardust photos -- nice and clear.

[OWW]

(2) DI did indeed take some calibration photos of the Moon shortly after leaving Earth, and one has been released. It looks -- unlike the fuzzy misted-up Stardust photos -- nice and clear.

Here it is:



119 days until impact.