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Canadian Robot Could Rescue Hubble
NETHED writes "We have all seen Stories about The Hubble Space Telescope and its current problems. Since then, NASA has okayed the fix of the HST. It seems that America's neighbor to the North has some answers. Dextre to the rescue. The mission would not be decided upon until next summer says Sean O'Keefe. It seems that NASA saw this as a good way to listen to the public for about 1.6 billion dollars." Update: 08/11 15:45 GMT by T : Reader Michael Mol dug up a link with a more technical explanation of Dextre, noting "It looks like Dextre's normally supposed to be attached to something before it performs work."
Err, wait. I retract my statement. I was thinking of the Canadarm.
I'm surprised someone modded me insightful already.
Here's a good link from the Canadian Space Agency's web site on Dextre (Special Purpose Dexterous Manipulator): http://www.space.gc.ca/asc/eng/csa_sectors/human_p re/iss/mss_spdm.asp
There are some good robotics folks in Canada. Most notably are the Canadarm (robotic arm on the Shuttle) and a few deep diving ocean exploration vehicles that have very advanced robotic arms and such on them (one of which, with some cosmetic changes, was used in "The Abyss").
You need to read up on Canada's history in space. We put up the first commercial communications satellite (no bouncing signals off of a baloon!), have the worlds most powerful communications satellites, built a synthetic aperture radar satellite with such precise imaging capabilities that the US refused to launch it, and the list goes on.
Its replacement also isn't scheduled to go up for another 7 years. And doesn't factor in the cost to get it up there yet. Or the labour to build the thing. Or the cost of fixing it when the inevitable problems crop up.
I'll give you a freaking break right away.
Yes, Canada was in fact the third country in space after the Russians and Americans. We were also the first country to have commercial geostationary satelities in space.
Here's a site with a brief timeline and notes aboot Canada in space
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I thought I read somewhere that while the JWST would "replace" Hubble, there was still some things that Hubble could do that JWST couldn't.
Is that true?
Left and Right in the political sense come from the post-revolutionary French National Assembly, where the conservatives sat on the right of the speaker while the radicals sat on the left.
Hey look! A mention of the French on Slashdot without any peurile French-bashing!
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Just this guy, you know?
They "see" different wavelengths of light. JWST is designed to see farther. They'll be looking at completely different things.
The question is more like "has Hubble 'seen' enough?"
Are there any more things we can usefully point it at, or do we have enough images to analyse as it is? Besides pretty desktop wallpapers, what type of knowledge or discoveries will that 1.6 billion to keep it up there get us?
I don't need no instructions to know how to rock!!!!
Not to mention humour, eh?
In Soviet Rush, today's Tom Sawyer gets high on you.
The robotic arms on the mars rovers are also Canadian. It seems like it's their specialty, and NASA is always full of praise of these tools.
"It's too bad that stupidity isn't painful." - Anton LaVey
We've all seen the same posts. Repeat after me, James Webb and Hubble see on different wavelengths. Therefore the Webb cannot replace Hubble. Don't be a troll.
Marvin knew: "Think of a number, any number..."
Like the arm, it's a teleoperator, controlled by somebody with joysticks.
Given how much a shuttle flight costs, it would probably be cheaper to just run off another copy of the Hubble and launch that.
I always chuckle when Canadians take credit for inventing the phone. Bell was a Scotsman! He had the idea while in Brantford and before he became an American, but I would say that was more coincidental as he hadn't spent that much time in Canada at that point.
Its replacement also isn't a 'replacement' the James Webb space observatory looks at a completely different set of wave lengths. Its about as much of a replacement as a boat is a replacement for a car.
They still don't even know what they are going to use to launch this thing. It's going to orbit further out than the moon does.
There's more issues besides just the cost too. Such as listed in the Report of the HST-JWST Transition Panel:
So where is the money best spent? Extending HST, or putting the rush on JWST? What can be sacrificed in expediting JWST? I don't know, but I assume NASA has qualified people to make those decisions, otherwise this would be an Ask Slashdot. Keep in mind, the US gov't apparently has billions of dollars to throw away on locating non-existent WMD, whats a billion or two on space research?
You must feel sooo cool.
Quite. It's only 6 degrees celsius outside this morning.
Ditching it isn't free either, unless you're talking about an uncontrolled reentry. From one proposal it would cost $300M (not including launch costs) to build an automated booster to attach to Hubble and safely deorbit it.