NASA’s iconic Hubble space station still has years of life left in it, and there are ideas to keep it going much longer — but those proposals may face uphill battles.
The Hubble Space Telescope, launched in 1990, has been serviced five times by astronauts and is in good health. But the telescope has been slowly aging toward Earth through natural drag from the atmosphere, so billionaire businessman and private astronaut Jared Isaacman proposed sending a maintenance mission to the telescope for the first time since 2009.
Isaacman – the commander of the private Inspiration4 mission in 2021, which he also financially supported – is the sponsor and astronaut of the Polaris project. Polaris is a three-mission private astronaut series flown with SpaceX hardware, which plans to launch its first commercial spacewalk this year with Polaris Dawn.
The Hubble proposal for the Polaris project was first made public in 2022, and NASA asked other companies to submit ideas in a request for information (ROI) that closed in early 2023. There are no official announcements about ROI yet, but the matter has recently resurfaced in the news with a report National Public Radio. The broadcaster obtained internal NASA emails through a Freedom of Information Act request that show a range of reactions, including concerns from some about Hubble’s risk.
Related: NASA wants ideas to lift the Hubble Space Telescope into high orbit with private spacecraft
Hubble’s last servicing mission in 2009 was a difficult decision for NASA. The agency, working in the wake of the 2003 Columbia space shuttle disaster that killed seven astronauts, canceled an initially scheduled maintenance mission. Their concern was that because of Hubble’s orbit, the space shuttle Atlantis, far from the orbital complex, would not be able to reach the International Space Station for help if needed.
After the scientific community raised concerns, NASA resumed the mission with a backup: another space shuttle, Endeavour, was prepared at the launch pad to assist Atlantis if needed. However, a carefully choreographed maintenance task does not require a backup; It met its main servicing targets for Hubble, and the astronauts returned home without incident.
Hubble continues to make observations following decades of innovative work in areas ranging from the expansion of the universe to studying changes in planetary weather.
Hubble can’t go on like this forever, though: instruments and systems are getting old, the telescope is experiencing occasional „safe modes” (most recently for about a week in April), and the pull of Earth’s atmosphere is slowly bringing it down from its orbit. Approximately 320 miles (515 kilometers). (By comparison, the ISS is about 250 miles, or 400 km, away.)
Also, the Space Shuttle and its adequate payload bay will no longer be available for repair; That program was retired in 2011, and new engineering solutions will be needed if anyone wants to service Hubble again. A timeline for such work would require several years of planning, and with no update on proposals since 2023, the status of a potential new service initiative is unclear.
Hubble’s instruments and primary subsystems (such as solar arrays and batteries) „will continue to operate into the late 2020s and into the 2030s,” barring any unforeseen events. NASA officials said. Still, Isaacman and the Polaris project hope to keep Hubble going for a long time — perhaps an additional two decades — through maintenance work.
Related: A private plan to rescue the Hubble telescope may also target space debris
The lengthy NPR report drew from interviewees and e-mails that ranged from praise for Polaris’ innovation and quality of technical work to concern about certain issues. Among those concerns is that Polaris has yet to perform a spacewalk, namely a SpaceX EVA [extravehicular activity] The suits have not yet been tested in space, as Hubble is difficult to reach even for NASA astronauts, and any spacewalk near the telescope risks damage.
(Isaacman was not available for an NPR interview due to his Polaris training schedule, SpaceX did not respond to NPR’s requests, and NASA sent brief statements to the broadcaster that publicly promised detailed follow-ups in the future. The European Space Agency, which also funded the telescope, was not interviewed.)
The NASA-Polaris Hubble Feasibility Study hasn’t been released yet, but „hopefully it will come out,” Isaacman said. Wrote in X (formerly Twitter) did a technical analysis for six months and made a formal recommendation.
Isaacman added that he fears that, in his view, the public discourse has been misplaced, falling into camps including „new space and old space, or people who love SpaceX and hate SpaceX, the incompetent tourist and the real astronaut”.
Related: Photos: NASA’s Hubble Space Telescope servicing missions
„It really should have been about the mission, because if a mission was planned it would involve resources in all the institutions that participated in the study to ensure success,” Isaacman emphasized.
„It’s not like anybody’s flying it, especially after a joint study comes together to generally determine how a successful mission can be achieved,” said Isaacman, who spent more than 6,000 hours piloting various aircraft, including time dealing with contingencies. or performing aircraft systems.
Isaacman paid tribute to past service missions managed by NASA. Each required multiple rounds of spacewalks and major instrument replacements, as well as the use of the space shuttle’s Canadian robotic arm, called Canadarm. Planning for these missions always takes years, including adequate spacewalk training of agency astronauts.
However, advances in electronics over the past 15 years mean „you can pack a lot of capability into an iPhone these days,” Isaacman said.
Regarding the risk of returning Hubble to service, Isaacman said that aside from Hubble falling back toward Earth, „many of the telescope systems have failed and lost most of their redundancy. That’s why it continues to be offline. .”
Recently NASA reportAgency officials pointed to a faulty gyroscope behind the April 2024 Safe Mode incident, as well as another gyroscope in November 2023. But two more gyroscopes can be used to steer Hubble in space.
Although three of Hubble’s six gyros are not operational, better performance is achieved by using at least three for pointing, the statement said, adding that the observatory „could continue scientific observations with only one gyro if necessary.” As for Hubble’s near-term health: „NASA expects Hubble to continue to make new discoveries,” the statement emphasized.
Hubble, Isaacman said, could only lift Polaris until it reached a „certain altitude,” at which point (according to Isaacman) it would return to Earth uncontrollably or — if a rescue attempt was needed at that point — it would have to be tackled by a robotic mission at taxpayer expense, depending on what NASA wanted to do. .
„Had a mission flown, I’m happy to fund it, I believe it would have led to improved capabilities that would have benefited the future of commercial space, and would have given Hubble a new lease on life,” Isaacman added.
„I admit it’s not my telescope to touch on, and a lot of time has passed for exploration. Government priorities are changing, budgets are tightening. Regardless of who’s funding the mission, it requires contributions from many parties. To ensure the success of whatever happens from here on out, all of us, including NASA, are in that I’m glad I took the time to see if they were worth the effort.
„Oddany rozwiązywacz problemów. Przyjazny hipsterom praktykant bekonu. Miłośnik kawy. Nieuleczalny introwertyk. Student.