The James Webb Telescope has already sustained permanent damage in space

The James Webb Telescope has already sustained permanent damage in space

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When sailing in space, the telescope James Webb has already suffered permanent damageaffecting one of them mirror. It is estimated that small space rocks were the ones that caused this incident last May. Now the POT is concerned about how this will damage the space telescope so much economic reversal has received.

If we talk about the most important event that has happened at NASA lately, we have to mention the James Webb Space Telescope. This took more than a decade to develop and taste 10 billion dollars after Several delays in the project. But ultimately the project was a success and it was launched into space giving us beautiful photos of the universe at one quality never seen before. However, they are now announcing that it has been permanently damaged, which is worrying given its short operating time.

The James Webb telescope received a total of 6 micrometeorite impacts

Impact micrometeorites James Webb Space Telescope

A little over half a year has passed since NASA sent the James Webb telescope into space, a December 25, 2021. Nevertheless, it has already suffered numerous damage from small space rocks or micrometeorites. Specifically, a total of 6 impacts that caused it are recorded mirror deformities. Happily, 5 of those hits were minorso NASA doesn’t give them too much importance.

These are considered expected accidents because the James Webb telescope was expected to suffer damage in space that would affect its mirrors. However, one of those 6 shots stood out from the others because it damaged them Mirror C3one of 18 golden telescope mirrors. Therefore, it was necessary to analyze it, and after an initial assessment, the Deputy Administrator of NASA, Thormas Zurbuchenexplained that the mirror C3 Worked well and met the requirements the mission.

However, in a recent report, a “little impact on performance of the telescope“. This has been ringing alarm bells since it was described as permanent damagenot correctable” for the James Webb. Also, it’s unknown how the damage to the mirror and the telescope itself will evolve over the long term, considering it’s only been in space for a few months.

The impact on the C3 mirror happened in May: NASA will try to avoid future damage

Damage Solutions for NASA's James Webb Telescope

Without a doubt, this effect exceeded the expectations of NASA researchers and staff. They didn’t think the impact of a single micrometeorite would permanently damage the James Webb telescope if the rest of the impacts weren’t a major problem. For this reason, the aerospace company decided to invest more in research and modeling around the space telescope project.

They also state that they are not sure how many such impacts the James Webb telescope could withstand before suffering serious damage. that might disable it. They also doubt that the hit in segment C3 was a rare event or is it the bug that the telescope has become more fragile than the previous model. Nevertheless, after analyzing the damage, they affirm that the space rock hit the James Webb’s C3 mirror between May 22nd and 24th.

Although it may seem like the end, NASA assures that it is looking into solutions to avoid this type of impact in the future. According to the company a possible solution is to limit the time that the telescope looks in the direction of the orbit. And it is that in this position, statistically, there are a greater number of micrometeorites and therefore a greater chance of being hit by them.

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