ESA Venus Express Status Report No. 47 – Solar Conjunction Phase Operational Strategy Tested
06 Oct 2006 13:46
Report for Period 24 September to 30 September 2006
The reporting period contained a spacecraft hardware safe which occurred on 27 September (DoY 270) at 04.37 UT.
The outage has caused the following impact at mission level:
- science operations from Safe Mode occurrence until spacecraft recovery to nominal operations (270 14.00) have been skipped
- USO switched OFF for about 10 hours
The spacecraft is now back to routine operations and nominal planning for the upcoming week has already been resumed.
The ground segment performance has been nominal throughout the reporting period. The table below shows a chronology of the main activities in the reporting period:
| MET (Day) | Date | DOY | VPER# | Main Activity |
| 313 | 17/09/06 | 260 | 149 | Routine science operations |
| 314 | 18/09/06 | 261 | 150 | Routine science operations |
| 315 | 19/09/06 | 262 | 151 | Routine science operations |
| 316 | 20/09/06 | 263 | 152 | Routine science operations SPS Project Interface Test with DSS25 |
| 317 | 21/09/06 | 264 | 153 | Routine science operations |
| 318 | 22/09/06 | 265 | 154 | Routine science operations |
| 319 | 23/09/06 | 266 | 155 | Safe Mode recovery Routine science operations |
At the end of the last Cebreros pass in the reporting period (DOY 273, 16:00) Venus Express was orbiting Venus at 255 million km from the Earth. The one-way signal travel time was 850 seconds.
Payload Activities
ASPERA
The instrument is regularly operated as part of the routine plan.
MAG
The instrument is regularly operated as part of the routine plan. At safe mode transition, the instrument was ON. The safing AP powered off the instrument. The instrument was switched back on as part of the SM recovery at DoY 270.
PFS
At safe mode transition, the instrument was ON. It was switched off by SM safing procedure without blocking of the pendulum. The PI recommended blocking the pendulum by additional commanding which was executed immediately after the recovery pass. The instrument is currently OFF and is not included in the routine planning.
SPICAV
The instrument is regularly operated as part of the routine plan.
VeRA
The USO is nominally powered but muted. After the Safe Mode the USO remained powered OFF for approximately 15 hours.
VIRTIS
The instrument is regularly operated as part of the routine plan. The safing AP did not close the cover of the instrument, which is currently under investigation.
VMC
The instrument is regularly operated as part of the routine plan. At safe mode transition the instrument was ON. The safing AP powered off the instrument.
Mission Planning
Short Term Planning
Operations of STP21 have been completed successfully and the planning of STP22 was completed in time. A pre-check of the payload requests for STP23 and STP24 was also successful. DSN key file for the upcoming solar corona observations has been produced and sent to DSN.
An operational strategy for the upcoming solar conjunction phase in October/November 2006 has been tested. Spacecraft Operations Requests (SOR) for the upcoming conjunction platform MTL operations have been created and are to be planned in the next cycles.
Medium Term Planning
MTP08 has been fully processed and a report has been generated.
Future Milestones
Throughout the next week short term planning for STP23 and the first 2 orbits of STP24 will be performed.
TM BR change to 38 kbps and TC BR change to 1 kbps occur on 4 October.
TM BR change to 22 kbps occur on 10 October.
SPS PIT 3-way D/L only (parallel to nominal Cebreros pass) test scheduled for 5 October.
