NASA's planet hunter shakes off reaction wheel woes and gets back to work

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NASA's planet hunter shakes off reaction wheel woes and gets back to work
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No more stress for TESS

NASA has confirmed that the Transiting Exoplanet Survey Satellite has recovered from a reaction wheel problem and resumed making observations.

The spacecraft dropped into safe mode on April 23 following an issue that occurred earlier in the month. The latest safe mode was triggered by a failure to dump momentum from TESS's reaction wheels, which requires using the spacecraft's propulsion system. The system had not been successfully repressurized following the earlier safe mode event on April 8.science operations.

The spacecraft is in a highly elliptical orbit, with its lowest point 67,000 miles from the Earth and its highest 232,000 miles away. Therefore, it is safely positioned away from the hazards of the Van Allen radiation belts and well above the geosynchronous orbit used by many communication satellites.

During its two-year primary mission, the observatory imaged approximately 75 percent of the sky, finding 66 new exoplanets – worlds outside the solar system – and 2,100 candidates requiring confirmation from astronomers.However, things are starting to stack up for the spacecraft, which is well into the bonus science period of its lifetime. In October 2022, the spacecraft entered safe mode following a surprise reset of its flight computer.

A third extension for TESS, which will take the mission from September 2025 to September 2028, is contingent on the outcome of the 2025 Astrophysics Senior Review. The project hasHeat shield that looks like the surface of the Moon plus fiberglass doors on the launch platform on the listNASA needs new ideas and tech to get Mars Sample Return mission off the ground

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