Completion of Initial Critical Phase of ADEOS-II (Midori-II)

The National Space Development Agency of Japan (NASDA) confirmed that
the Advanced Earth Observing Satellite II (ADEOS-II “Midori-II”),
which was launched from Tanegashima Space Center on 14 December 2002
at 10:31 am (Japan Standard Time), deployed an antenna for
inter-satellite communications on 17 December at 9:25 am (JST),
started the attitude control by wheel control at around 11:08
am and maintaining its attitude stably.

This is a completion of an initial critical phase* and ADEOS-II
(Midori-II) moves into a next operation phase. At the next phase,
ADEOS-II will move into an observing orbit and perform a functional
verification of onboard equipment.

As to the Advanced Microwave Scanning Radiometer (AMSR) in which some
abnormal signal was detected at its processing time, a command signal
was sent to reset such abnormal signal on 15 December at around
4:45 pm, and the signal was confirmed to get back to normal.

Continuously, the cases of the injection counts, which were observed
more than the expected figures at the attitude control by 1N (Newton)
thruster, and some data to monitor the tension of a solar array paddle
didn’t meet standards will be investigated to find their causes.

* This is a very important, but difficult operation phase at an early
stage of a satellite launch, before a basic function of the satellite
is ensured such as power, 3-axis attitude control.

Related links : ADEOS-II/H-IIA F4 Countdown
http://h2a.nasda.go.jp/index_e.html