Science operations about to resume on Europe’s two-satellite Proba-3 space telescope
The Proba-3 mission. Click for original.
After months of trouble-shooting after losing contact with the coronagraph probe of Europe’s two-satellite Proba-3 solar space telesscope in February 2026, engineers have successfully resumed precise formation flying of the two spacecraft, and are about to resume full science observations of the Sun’s corona.
The mission is explained in the graph to the right. In February all contact with the coronagraph, which holds the mission’s science instruments, was lost. After a month of struggle, engineers regained contact, but it required another few months of trouble-shooting to pin down the cause of the problem and fix it. The press release provides almost no information about that cause, other than this one quote that hints it was software-based.
“One by one, we have checked the status of each of the spacecraft’s subsystems. We have also been able to successfully perform the operations that proved critical in February,” says Damien. “Back then, it triggered the unfortunate chain reaction that led to loss of connection with the spacecraft, but after patching the root cause in the software, we were confident that this activity will cause no further issues.”
With both spacecraft once again operating in tandem, the occulter can block the Sun’s light so the coronagraph can observe the Sun’s corona, its atmosphere. Essentially, Proba-3 creates an on-going artificial eclipse so as to make the corona visible for study.
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The ability to remotely troubleshoot and fix (not necessarily ‘repair’) operating problems from great distances, has impressed me since childhood. I understand that some of this capability is designed into the machine, but I’ve been flummoxed by machinery to which I had full access.
Fixing problems at a distance is made possible by design.
A bit of copy-editing:
Insert the word ‘the’ between the words ‘with’ and ‘coronagraph’ in the first sentence.
Insert the string ‘, was lost’ before the period ending the first sentence of the second paragraph.
Change misspelled word ‘tandom’ to ‘tandem’ in last sentence.
Dick Eagleson: Thank you. Fixed.