The micrometeoroid hit the recently launched James Webb Space Telescope, killing one of its gilded mirrors out of alignment, NASA said of the May incident.
NASA says micrometeorological shocks are “an inevitable aspect of the operation of any spacecraft” and “expected in the construction and testing of the mirror.” (AP archive)
A mirror of the James Webb Space Telescope was hit by a micrometeroid last month, but is expected to continue to function normally, NASA said.
“After initial assessments, the team found that the telescope is still operating at a level that exceeds all mission requirements, despite a slight noticeable effect in the data,” the US space agency said on Thursday.
“Webb’s early life efficiency is still well above expectations and the observatory is fully capable of fulfilling the science it is designed to achieve,” he added.
One of the main mirror segments of the space observatory was hit by a micrometeoroid, which is usually smaller than a grain of sand between May 23 and 25.
NASA said that micrometeorological shocks are “an inevitable aspect of the operation of any spacecraft” and “expected during the construction and testing of the mirror.”
“This latest impact was greater than modeled, and beyond what the team could test on the ground,” it said.
Lee Feinberg, NASA’s Goddard Web Element Telescope Element Manager, said that “with Web’s mirrors exposed to space, we expected accidental micrometeorological shocks to gracefully impair the telescope’s performance over time.
“Since launch, we have had four smaller measurable micrometeorological shocks that met expectations,” Feinberg said.
Study of space aspects
The telescope, which is expected to cost NASA nearly $ 10 billion, is one of the most expensive scientific platforms ever created, comparable to its predecessor Hubble and the Large Hadron Collider at CERN.
The Web’s mission includes studying distant planets known as exoplanets to determine their origins, evolution and habitability, and is expected to create “spectacular color images” of space in mid-July.
The telescope has spent the past few months aligning its instruments in preparation for the big discovery.
NASA has said that to protect the Web, flight crews can turn optics away from known meteor showers.
It says that the impact of the micrometeoroid in May is not the result of meteor showers, but “an inevitable accident”.
Source: AFP
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