The Coffee House

(Sort of a continuation of this thread, from the old forum: http://s1.zetaboards.com/The_Coffee_Hous...706/1/#new)

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/science-environment-45400144

If it does launch as currently scheduled in 2021, it will be 14 years late. When finally in position, though - orbiting the Sun 1.5 million km from Earth - Nasa's James Webb Space Telescope promises an astronomical revolution.

The US space agency boasts that it will literally "look back in time to see the very first galaxies that formed in the early Universe".

As if those claims were not bold enough, scientists have now surmised that the eventual successor to the world famous and beloved Hubble Space Telescope may - thanks to its 6.5m golden mirror and exquisitely sensitive cameras - have a another extraordinary talent.

The JWST, as it is called, may be able to look for signs of alien life - detecting whether atmospheres of planets orbiting nearby stars are being modified by that life.

Despite this, the project to build it narrowly survived cancellation by the US Government in 2011. That was in no small part down to its (perhaps appropriately) astronomical cost - an estimated $10bn rather than its originally planned $1bn.

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Wow, 14 years late . It had better be worth the wait!

One thing that does worry me is that it'll be placed 1 million miles away from Earth - so, if anything breaks, it won't be feasible to go and repair it .

Wow. That is so cool! I hope this is successful!

And now, all of the pieces have come together for the first time :

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/science-environment-49504866

Let's hope the tests go well, so the launch remains on track!

Good news - the full mirror has been moved successfully, into the position that it will take up when it is in space:

https://www.nasa.gov/feature/goddard/202...-a-success

Sounds like this thing is still progressing ! (Although, COVID-19 has disrupted work on the telescope, so I suspect its March 2021 launch date might have to be delayed...)

Sadly, the launch date has been pushed back yet again. My previous post said "March 2021", but it was later delayed until October 2021 - and now, problems with the Ariane 5 rocket have forced another delay until late November or early December:

https://arstechnica.com/science/2021/06/...ips-again/

I hope this is the last delay - although, considering the original plan was for a launch in 2007, I'm really not holding my breath !!!

I'm super excited for this particular telescope, the hope is that it'll make finding and studying exoplanetary systems easier, as well as potentially getting the first real pictures of planets around nearby stars.

(06-03-2021, 12:19 AM)Spook of the lost Wrote: [ -> ]I'm super excited for this particular telescope, the hope is that it'll make finding and studying exoplanetary systems easier, as well as potentially getting the first real pictures of planets around nearby stars.

Same here - though, I'm also preparing myself for the possibility of it being a complete dud, due to it breaking down when it's 1 million miles from Earth .

But, if that doesn't happen, then I'm sure it'll send back some awesome pictures - as well as teaching us some valuable science!

There's been a bit of a controversy surrounding the naming of the telescope. It concerns the fact that James Webb was the administrator of NASA during the "Lavender Scare", in which LGBT people were driven out of government jobs. However, NASA has investigated the matter, and decided not to change the name:

https://www.npr.org/2021/09/30/104170773...3095265382

Probably the right decision, IMO. Yes, the persecution of LGBT people was abhorrent - but, there's no evidence that he was directly involved in it (or even that he knew other others were doing it). All we can really say is "He was head of the organisation while it was happening" - and, in my opinion, that's not a good enough reason to change the name. I'm pretty sure every head of a large organisation will have had something troubling happening somewhere within the organisation on their watch - especially if we're assessing things by the moral standards of today, rather than the standards of the time.

If we're not going to name things after people unless every part of everything they did was completely clean by the standards of today - then, perhaps it's time to just stop naming anything after anybody, because as far as I can tell, that's the only way that that standard will ever be met.

And now, at long last, we have a final launch date . The launch will take place on 24th December:

https://www.space.com/james-webb-space-t...-confirmed

Best of luck to them! All the hard work that's gone into this had better not be a waste .

Well, the launch took place today - and, I'm pleased to report that it was a great success :



It'll take about 30 days to reach its destination (the Lagrange point L2, about 930,000 miles from Earth) - and, assuming all goes well, the first images should come back in Summer 2022 .