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With the World Watching,
Hubble’s Life Extended
“The
Hubble telescope has become the Washington Monument of U.S.
science - beautiful, beloved and important..” Those were the
words of Daniel Henninger reporting on the recent repair
mission in the Wall Street Journal. He went on to
write that the Hubble represents “the tour de force of tools
and human ingenuity.”
The
media worldwide reported daily on the progress of the 13-day
mission on the last service call to the Hubble Space
Telescope 350 miles above the earth..
After
19 years in space, the Hubble is now expected to begin 5 to
10 years of operation..
For
years, astronomers around the world have marveled at the
revealing images and acclaimed the Hubble the greatest
achievement in astronomy since the first use of a telescope
by Galileo. With major repairs completed, results are
expected to be far greater.
Hundreds of Perkin-Elmer men and women contributed to the
development of key elements of the 12.5-ton orbiting
observatory. The Optical Telescope Assembly and the Fine
Guidance Sensors have the Perkin-Elmer nameplate on them and
are two critical elements of the system.
Dan
McCarthy, the first Project Manager of the HST,
comments.
“Hubble was a bold
and even risky project, a sea change move beyond the old
ways of exploring the heavens. Big steps take courage, but
they can and this one did produce spectacular results.
Hubble was planned and executed with great care. That it has
been so successful an adventure is a great accomplishment
and should be no surprise.” More from Dan later.
Bob
Jones, Chief Engineer: “We were staying at a lodge in
Yosemite during the week of the mission and had no access to
newspapers or TV. They did a fantastic job, especially with
the 111 screws. I talked to Ernie Bateman about the
frozen bolt on the wide-side camera. Ernie turned that bolt
many times in Danbury. I am looking forward to many more
years of fantastic performance.”
Paul Petty was Vice President of Perkin-Elmer and
General Manager of the Optical Technology Division. Paul
said, “The ability of the astronauts to remove and replace
the axial and radial instruments is a testimonial to our P-E
engineers. They designed a Focal Plane Structure that could
withstand the buffeting of a rocket launch, maintain
alignment within microns, and allow the removal and
replacement on orbit to the same precision. The astronaut
repair on orbit of the Advanced Camera for Surveys (ACS), a
third generation wider-field camera, and the Space Telescope
Imaging Spectrometer (STIC) was an outstanding achievement.
However, our P-E System Analysts predicted that allowing the
instrument designers to use individual power supplies
instead of a common Hi-Rel (high reliable) source would
result in multiple failures. They were right. The STIS was
lost in ‘04 and the ACS in ‘07.” Dick Babish,
Technical Director: “I had the privilege of
participating in much of the activities of the Hubble from
the early days even before the proposal when we were engaged
in conceiving solutions to what were even then known to be
critical advances in technology. The HST lives up to
expectations in the most dramatic fashion, leading to
unexpected new questions about the universe, as well as
answers to older ones. Now that we are retiring the only
shuttle, this last mission attempts to extend the useful
life as much as possible while attaching devices that will
permit attachment of re-entry devices that will gracefully
guide the Hubble into the sea safely. It will be a sad day
when the Hubble will meet its inevitable end. Yet, it will
culminate a prideful period in my life having spent so much
of it on its evolution.”
Dan
McCarthy added: “It all started in the astronomical
community. They saw its great potential and more importantly
put in the effort needed to get it recognized. The Hubble’s
success and long life was also greatly aided, I believe, by
the utilization of the P-E Danbury facility and the big
program experience resident there, which contributed to the
quality and reliability of the Hubble hardware. Also,
critical to the success was process changes implemented by
NASA to address science to be investigated (Space Telescope
Institute) and the operation management by the Goddard Space
Flight Center.” Dan concluded by commenting that “this last
visit replaced some key operating hardware and added new and
much improved instrumentation. Expect Hubble to be around
for a long time.”
Our
website -
www.RCNews.org - has several links to Hubble sites.
Explored are the history of the program, phenomenal images
achieved, and its meaning to advances in astronomy and
technology.
The
huge technological success of the Hubble is testimony to the
ingenuity of Perkin-Elmer people, and is indicative of the
worldwide leadership of each of the technologies the company
was engaged in. The Perkin-Elmer name will be inscribed
indelibly on the Hubble and its meaning to mankind.. No one
can ever take that away!!
–by Don Mahon |