Timeline for Has the small meteorite that hit Webb done a lot of damage?
Current License: CC BY-SA 4.0
20 events
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| Jul 13, 2022 at 23:53 | comment | added | 2012rcampion | The first photo shows damage to Hubble's antenna, but the text makes it sound like it shows damage to the primary mirror. | |
| Jul 11, 2022 at 23:42 | comment | added | Dennis Williamson | I would love to see a photograph of the WFPC2 radiator before it was drilled or of the sampled cores. NASA inspection report (PDF) | |
| Jun 14, 2022 at 18:03 | comment | added | Roger Wood | @DavidHammen Great answer, David. Still I'm dissapointed NASA doesn't release anything more quantitative. I suppose in the fullness of time there will be a scientific paper written, but at the moment it seems there's precious little information available. | |
| Jun 11, 2022 at 12:01 | comment | added | David Hammen | @zibadawatimmy All the information we have to date is what NASA has released. NASA has claimed a "marginally detectable effect in the data." That certainly sounds like a "no big deal, move along sir" type of thing to me. We'll find out in a month or so when the Space Science Telescope Institute releases the first images. The JWST is predicted to be fully commissioned by 12 July 2022. | |
| Jun 11, 2022 at 11:38 | history | edited | David Hammen | CC BY-SA 4.0 |
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| Jun 11, 2022 at 3:27 | comment | added | zibadawa timmy | @DavidHammen The part where you quotes say that the latest micrometeorite was larger than they had planned for, and they are now recomputing or whatever to include such impactors, kind of undercuts these "no big deal, just standard impacts, move along, sir" type of thing. It still might be that, but "oops, didn't see this coming, let's redo some numbers..." sounds rather more significant than that. | |
| Jun 11, 2022 at 2:42 | comment | added | uhoh | I mean at least preface your answer with "I don't have any actual direct information on the damage, but here's what we can infer from public statements; it's not so bad as to change the observing schedule." | |
| Jun 10, 2022 at 22:27 | comment | added | uhoh | Without any actual information on the damage it seems like "The damage is not so extensive that it changed the operating schedule" is the extent to which an answer can be supported. All the "emphatic"s feels more like public relations, but I suppose that's okay. | |
| Jun 10, 2022 at 19:26 | comment | added | David Hammen | @DarrelHoffman It indicates the IR frequency (or wavelength) at which the various instruments observe. The NIRCam, NIRSpec, and NIRISS all observe in the near infrared (NIR), hence their names. The MIRI observes in the mid-infrared. Observing in the mid-infrared requires rather low temperatures. | |
| Jun 10, 2022 at 18:46 | comment | added | David Hammen | @uhoh Regarding the second question, How seriously must we take this? That again deserves an emphatic no, at least for now. Over the course of the next decade or two, the accumulation of MMOD damage is one of the many ways the JWST might fail over time. The damage from just one micrometeoroid is not something to worry about now. | |
| Jun 10, 2022 at 18:40 | comment | added | David Hammen | @uhoh The title of the question asked Has the small meteorite that hit Webb done a lot of damage? That most definitely is a very emphatic no. NASA long ago gave up on whitewashing problems. Recently, NASA has been very upfront when an astronaut on an EVA has their helmets start to fill with water, or when an automated spacecraft fails to deploy, or when a Mars rover gets stuck or damaged. The truth would come out in a month if the micrometeoroid had caused a "lot of damage" when NASA said the damage was at most minimal. | |
| Jun 10, 2022 at 17:35 | comment | added | Darrel Hoffman | OT, but is there some significance to those sine waves behind the hexagons in that image? Specifically curious why the MIRI one appears to have a longer period than the other 3. I'd say it was something like "number of orbits before we do this", but #4 is already complete on NIRISS before #1-3, so that doesn't seem to mean anything. | |
| Jun 10, 2022 at 11:43 | comment | added | uhoh | I see that the word "emphatic" has been added, twice no less! But still not seeing how no change in operating schedule proves there is no degradation of performance; if performance was changed in a small but measurable way, why would that show up in the operating schedule? It's an impressive looking answer to a question that was not asked, but not really an answer to the OP's actual question. | |
| Jun 10, 2022 at 7:01 | history | edited | David Hammen | CC BY-SA 4.0 |
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| Jun 10, 2022 at 6:54 | history | edited | David Hammen | CC BY-SA 4.0 |
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| Jun 9, 2022 at 20:26 | history | edited | David Hammen | CC BY-SA 4.0 |
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| Jun 9, 2022 at 20:08 | comment | added | uhoh | I didn't read the article at all, so can't misread it. I'm just commenting on the extent to which the OP's question is answered here, and I think you haven't yet answered it. | |
| Jun 9, 2022 at 20:07 | comment | added | David Hammen | @uhoh You are misreading the article. The JWST is not quite ready for prime time. The long delay between arrival in the halo orbit about Sun-Earth L1 point and becoming operational was planned from the very start. (If anything, the team appears to be ahead of schedule.) The team is going ahead with the checkout procedures that need to be performed prior to attaining operational status and that were planned years in advance. Those checkout procedures have nothing to do with the micrometeoroid collisions. | |
| Jun 9, 2022 at 19:49 | comment | added | uhoh | "The article to which you linked answers the question" No I do not think it does answer the OP's question, which is not about the impact on the schedule but about the nature and extent of the actual damage. Your block quote only says "as the team continues to check out the science instruments’ observing modes" which suggests to me they're still checking for damage. All the stuff about spacecraft design is nice, but can you address the OP's question about the nature and extent of the damage in a fact-based way? | |
| Jun 9, 2022 at 19:13 | history | answered | David Hammen | CC BY-SA 4.0 |