Status Report

Stardust Status Report 2 Feb 2001

By SpaceRef Editor
February 2, 2001
Filed under ,

There were numerous Deep Space Network (DSN) tracking passes in the past
week and all subsystems are performing normally.

The successful flyby of Earth was so precise that trajectory correction
maneuver 6 (TCM-6), planned for mid-February to correct the trajectory
errors during Earth flyby, was cancelled. Pre-launch studies showed that
TCM-6 might have to correct the trajectory as much as 2.7 meters/second,
but after the flyby, TCM-6 was calculated only to be 0.4 meters/second. The
precision flyby of Earth has allowed the flight team to remove a major
scheduled activity, a reward for the hard work leading to a near-perfect
Earth gravity assist.

Sequence SC027 is the active sequence and the Sequence SC028 kickoff
meeting was completed. Sequence SC028 marks the start of the Cometary
Interplanetary Dust Analyzer (CIDA) instrument Interstellar collection
Period (ISP) #2. The CIDA impact target will be pointed to optimize
interstellar dust particle impacts through July.

For more information on the STARDUST mission – the first ever comet
sample return mission – please visit the STARDUST home page:

http://stardust.jpl.nasa.gov

SpaceRef staff editor.