Space Shuttle STS-109 Columbia Hubble Space Telescope Servicing Mission SM3B 2002 NASA
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‘JSC1915 – (2002) – 17 Minutes
Commander: Scott D. Altman
Pilot: Duane G. Carey
Mission Specialists: John M. Grunsfeld, Nancy J. Currie, Richard M. Linnehan, James H. Newman, Michael J. Massimino
Dates: March 1-12, 2002
Vehicle: Columbia OV-102
Payloads: HST Repair
Landing Site: Runway 33 at Kennedy Space Center, FL’
NASA film JSC-1915
Public domain film from NASA, slightly cropped to remove uneven edges, with the aspect ratio corrected, and mild video noise reduction applied.
The soundtrack was also processed with volume normalization, noise reduction, clipping reduction, and/or equalization.
STS-109 (SM3B) was a Space Shuttle mission that launched from the Kennedy Space Center on 1 March 2002. It was the 108th mission of the Space Shuttle program, the 27th flight of the orbiter Columbia and the fourth servicing of the Hubble Space Telescope. It was also the last successful mission of the orbiter Columbia before the ill-fated STS-107 mission, which culminated in the Columbia Disaster.
The Hubble Space Telescope (HST) was placed in orbit during mission STS-31 on 25 April 1990. Initially designed to operate for 15 years, plans for periodic service and refurbishment were incorporated into its mission from the start. After the successful completion of the second planned service mission (SM2) by the crew of STS-82 in February 1997, three of HST’s six gyroscopes failed. NASA decided to split the third planned service mission into two parts, SM3A and SM3B. A fifth and final servicing mission, STS-125 (SM4) launched 11 May 2009 The work performed during SM4 is expected to keep HST in operation through 2014. Further plans for servicing after SM4 are ambiguous as NASA is planning to launch HST’s successor, the James Webb Space Telescope in 2014…
The purpose of STS-109 was to service the Hubble Space Telescope (HST). It was Columbia’s first flight following an extensive two and a half year modification period (its most recent mission being STS-93). During the mission they installed a new science instrument, the Advanced Camera for Surveys (ACS), new rigid Solar Arrays (SA3), new Power Control Unit (PCU) and a new Cryocooler for the Near Infrared Camera and Multi-Object Spectrometer (NICMOS). STS-109 also reboosted HST to a higher orbit.
The STS-109 astronauts performed a total of five spacewalks in five consecutive days to service and upgrade the Hubble Space Telescope. The spacewalkers received assistance from their crewmates inside Columbia. Currie operated the Shuttle’s robot arm while Altman was her backup. Carey and Altman documented the EVA activities with video and still images.
Accomplishments of the spacewalks included the installation of new solar arrays, a new camera, a new Power Control Unit, a Reaction Wheel Assembly and an experimental cooling system for the NICMOS unit. STS-109 accumulated a total of 35 hours, 55 minutes of EVA time. Following STS-109, a total of 18 spacewalks had been conducted during four Space Shuttle missions to service Hubble (the others being STS-61, STS-82, STS-103 and STS-125) for a total of 129 hours, 10 minutes by 14 different astronauts.
It was also the last successful flight of the Columbia orbiter, as on its next mission, STS-107, it disintegrated on re-entry, killing all on board.
STS-109 is considered a night launch, as sunrise was at 6:47 am, and Columbia launched at 6:22 am EST, 25 minutes before sunrise.
The Hubble Space Telescope (HST) is a space telescope that was carried into orbit by a Space Shuttle in 1990 and remains in operation. A 2.4-meter (7.9 ft) aperture telescope in low Earth orbit, Hubble’s four main instruments observe in the near ultraviolet, visible, and near infrared. The telescope is named after the astronomer Edwin Hubble.
Hubble’s orbit outside the distortion of Earth’s atmosphere allows it to take extremely sharp images with almost no background light. Hubble’s Ultra-Deep Field image, for instance, is the most detailed visible-light image ever made of the universe’s most distant objects. Many Hubble observations have led to breakthroughs in astrophysics, such as accurately determining the rate of expansion of the universe.
Although not the first space telescope, Hubble is one of the largest and most versatile, and is well known as both a vital research tool and a public relations boon for astronomy. The HST was built by the United States space agency NASA, with contributions from the European Space Agency, and is operated by the Space Telescope Science Institute. The HST is one of NASA’s Great Observatories, along with the Compton Gamma Ray Observatory, the Chandra X-ray Observatory, and the Spitzer Space Telescope…
