Episode 39: March 19th 2011: Spacecraft Operations

Scroll to the bottom for the audio and video. Since the launch of
Sputnik 1 in 1957, thousands of unmanned spacecraft have been
launched, mostly to Earth orbit, but many have gone to the inner
and outer planets, and four of them have pretty much left the Solar
System altogether. European Space Agency’s Mars Express spacecraft
arrived at Mars in 2003 and is still operating almost a decade
later. It is operated by people in a profession initiated by the
space age itself. Spacecraft Operations Engineers are the
individuals who quietly take over the responsibility of spacecraft
after the nerve wrenching excitement of the launch is over. Thomas
Ormston, a Spacecraft Operations Engineer for VEGA Space GmbH,
working at the European Space Operations Centre on the European
Space agency's Mars Express mission describes in this episode the
steps involved in controlling Mars Express from over one hundred
million miles from Earth. The Hubble Space Telescope is the single
instrument that has probably contributed more to science in the
last decade than any other. Its success is not the size of its 2.4m
mirror, there are many larger telescopes on Earth but its location.
Many amateur astronomers have captured images of Mars using a
webcam. Such images are usually tiny but with integration
techniques a surprising amount of surface details is visible. What
would it be like if you could put that webcam in Martian orbit?
Thomas and his colleagues have done just that. Several ESA
spacecraft have an attached Visual Monitoring Cameras (VMC), 
usually installed for a very specific purpose. Mars Express had one
to monitor the release of Beagle 2, after that it was switched off.
Thomas describes the details behind the project that reactivated
the camera in a paper published online and the fascinating video
compiled from 600 images taken by the VMC webcam during the 7 hour
Martian orbit on 27th May 2010. It continues to take images which
are posted here. _________________________ Today’s quote from John
Lennon is about the critical importance of the role of human
understanding in interpreting the real world, even when you have
all the evidence that you could possible desire. Reality leaves a
lot to the imagination _________________________ Audio  
Episode 39: March 19th 2011 - Spacecraft Operations from
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