Mars Odyssey Mission Status Report – 8 April 2001

One day after launch from Cape Canaveral, Fla., the
Mars Odyssey mission continues to go exceedingly well.

Following acquisition of the spacecraft’s signal by a
Deep Space Network ground station at Canberra, Australia,
shortly before 9 a.m. Pacific time Saturday, the mission team
has continued to monitor the status of spacecraft subsystems,
all of which are performing normally. Ground controllers
established a two-way communication link between Mars Odyssey
and Earth, enabling the navigation team to start collecting
data to assess the spacecraft’s flight path.

Among various housekeeping events Saturday, the team
commanded the spacecraft to transmit to Earth at a high rate
for playback of data recorded during launch. They also
commanded a desaturation of the spacecraft’s reaction wheels,
a procedure in which the gyro-like devices are spun down in
order to remove excess momentum. Ground controllers concluded
that an alarm triggered shortly after launch by a temperature
sensor on Odyssey’s solar panel is not a concern. Saturday
afternoon they switched to a ground station at Santiago,
Chile, to communicate with the spacecraft. The project is
using Santiago to fill gaps in its Deep Space Network tracking
coverage during early cruise.

This morning the team commanded the spacecraft to
transition out of a “safe mode” it was in during launch to a
normal operating mode. They also turned the spacecraft so that
the medium-gain antenna that Odyssey is transmitting over is
pointed toward Earth. As of late morning, the team was
assessing the state of spacecraft subsystems, and if all is
well a command will be sent this afternoon to make the
transition complete.

Early navigation calculations show that the magnitude
of the first trajectory correction maneuver fine-tuning the
spacecraft’s flight path April 16 will be only 6 meters per
second. Because that maneuver will be so small, propellant
will be saved for use during Mars orbit insertion, aerobraking
and the orbital mission.

Odyssey will reach Mars on October 24, after which it
will spend about two months adjusting its orbit before
beginning a four-year mission studying the red planet.