[FPSPACE] Hubble anomaly causes delay for Shuttle mission

[Zeger]

>
> NASA TO DISCUSS HUBBLE ANOMALY AND SERVICING MISSION LAUNCH DELAY
>
> WASHINGTON -- NASA will host a media teleconference at 6 p.m. EDT 
> today to discuss a significant Hubble Space Telescope anomaly that 
> occurred this weekend affecting the storage and transmittal of 
> science data to Earth. Fixing the problem will delay next month's 
> space shuttle Atlantis' Hubble servicing mission. 
>
> The briefing participants are: 
> - Ed Weiler, associate administrator of the Science Mission 
> Directorate at NASA Headquarters in Washington 
> - John Shannon, Shuttle Program manager at NASA's Johnson Space Center 
> in Houston 
> - Preston Burch, Hubble manager at NASA's Goddard Space Flight Center 
> in Greenbelt, Md. 
>
> To participate in the teleconference, reporters in the U.S. should 
> call 1-800-369-6087 and use the pass code Hubble. International 
> reporters should call 1-773-756-0843. 
>
> As a result of the launch delay, NASA has postponed the planned Oct. 3 
> Flight Readiness Review and subsequent news conference. The review 
> will occur at a later date. 
>
> The malfunctioning system is Hubble's Control Unit/Science Data 
> Formatter - Side A. Shortly after 8 p.m. on Saturday, Sept. 27, the 
> telescope's spacecraft computer issued commands to safe the payload 
> computer and science instruments when errors were detected within the 
> Science Data Formatter. An attempt to reset the formatter and obtain 
> a dump of the payload computer's memory was unsuccessful. 
>
> Additional testing demonstrates Side A no longer supports the transfer 
> of science data to the ground. A transition to the redundant Side B 
> should restore full functionality to the science instruments and 
> operations. 
>
> The transition to Side B operations is complex. It requires that five 
> other modules used in managing data also be switched to their B-side 
> systems. The B-sides of these modules last were activated during 
> ground tests in the late 1980's and/or early 1990, prior to launch. 
> The Hubble operations team has begun work on the Side B transition and 
> believes it will be ready to reconfigure Hubble later this week. The 
> transition will happen after the team completes a readiness review. 
>
> Hubble could return to science operations in the immediate future if 
> the reconfiguration is successful. Even so, the agency is 
> investigating the possibility of flying a back-up replacement system, 
> which could be installed during the servicing mission. 
>
> Audio of the teleconference will be streamed live at: 
>
>
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> http://www.nasa.gov/newsaudio 
>
>
> Related images for the briefing will be available at: 
>
>
>
> http://www.nasa.gov/hubble 
>
>