Engineers free stuck radar antenna on Juice probe to Jupiter’s big moons
Engineers have successfully freed the 52-foot wide radar antenna on the Juice probe to Jupiter, shaking it enough to release a pin that was blocking deployment.
The pin was freed by employing “back-to-back jolts”. Imagine when you roll your car back and forth to get it freed from mud or snow. It appears this is what they did with the pin.
Juice will arrive in Jupiter orbit in 2031, where it will make numerous fly-bys of Europa, Calisto, and Ganymede, and then settle into an orbit around Ganymede alone. The radar antenna was essential for probing the ice content of these worlds, below the surface.
Hat tip to reader Mike Nelson.
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Engineers have successfully freed the 52-foot wide radar antenna on the Juice probe to Jupiter, shaking it enough to release a pin that was blocking deployment.
The pin was freed by employing “back-to-back jolts”. Imagine when you roll your car back and forth to get it freed from mud or snow. It appears this is what they did with the pin.
Juice will arrive in Jupiter orbit in 2031, where it will make numerous fly-bys of Europa, Calisto, and Ganymede, and then settle into an orbit around Ganymede alone. The radar antenna was essential for probing the ice content of these worlds, below the surface.
Hat tip to reader Mike Nelson.
Readers!
Please consider supporting my work here at Behind the Black. Your support allows me the freedom and ability to analyze objectively the ongoing renaissance in space, as well as the cultural changes -- for good or ill -- that are happening across America. Fourteen years ago I wrote that SLS and Orion were a bad ideas, a waste of money, would be years behind schedule, and better replaced by commercial private enterprise. Only now does it appear that Washington might finally recognize this reality.
In 2020 when the world panicked over COVID I wrote that the panic was unnecessary, that the virus was apparently simply a variation of the flu, that masks were not simply pointless but if worn incorrectly were a health threat, that the lockdowns were a disaster and did nothing to stop the spread of COVID. Only in the past year have some of our so-called experts in the health field have begun to recognize these facts.
Your help allows me to do this kind of intelligent analysis. I take no advertising or sponsors, so my reporting isn't influenced by donations by established space or drug companies. Instead, I rely entirely on donations and subscriptions from my readers, which gives me the freedom to write what I think, unencumbered by outside influences.
You can support me either by giving a one-time contribution or a regular subscription. There are four ways of doing so:
1. Zelle: This is the only internet method that charges no fees. All you have to do is use the Zelle link at your internet bank and give my name and email address (zimmerman at nasw dot org). What you donate is what I get.
2. Patreon: Go to my website there and pick one of five monthly subscription amounts, or by making a one-time donation.
3. A Paypal Donation or subscription:
4. Donate by check, payable to Robert Zimmerman and mailed to
Behind The Black
c/o Robert Zimmerman
P.O.Box 1262
Cortaro, AZ 85652
You can also support me by buying one of my books, as noted in the boxes interspersed throughout the webpage or shown in the menu above.
It is generally thought that rocket science is above “have you tried turning it off and then back on again?” and “shake it and hope it gets unstuck” but alas.
At least they got it working, that’s good news.
I look forward to the day when probes can be given a supervised zero-G deployment in a space station, before being sent on their way!
Agreed
Not quite an asteroid probe. Jupiter moons (Europa, Ganymede, Calisto) probe.
I’m glad they resolved this. Love that they have these tricks in space to do it. “Flight of the Dragonfly”, sci fi novel, posited having these hand sized spiders as mechanical assistants for the crew. Would it be worth having something like that crawling on our deep space probes to flick a thing here or poke a thing there?
David Telford: I was tired after a hike and wasn’t thinking. I have changed the headline.
Star Trek XI (2009) –
Enterprise and Fleet leaves Space Dock…
https://youtu.be/WLHO_E_U8o4
1:10