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STS-93 - Chandra Deployment Mission
 Deployment of Chandra
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Over the course of the next nine days a second propulsion system
fired five times to take the observatory to its final orbit. In
this orbit, the distance of Chandra from Earth ranged from
16,000 km (9,942 miles) to 133,000 km (about 82,646 miles), more
than a third of the way to the moon. The time to complete an
orbit is 64 hours and 18 minutes. This allows for observation
times as long as 52 hours, much longer than can be achieved with
the low-Earth orbit of a few hundred kilometers used by most
satellites.
While the secondary propulsion system maneuvered Chandra into
its final orbit, instructions were sent to the spacecraft to
power up the scientific instruments and allow them to adjust to
the low temperatures and vacuum of space. This process took
about two and a half weeks. The Sunshade door opened toward the
end of the third week after launch and Chandra's mirrors focused
X-rays from a cosmic source onto the CCD detector.
The first few days of observing were used to get the detectors
in focus, and to check out the performance of the mirrors and
instruments. All the instruments were moved in and out of the
focus during this checkout, or calibration phase. This procedure
took an additional few weeks before completion, but the Chandra
science team was rewarded with beautiful images about one month
after launch. Visit our Photo
Album for the first images observed!!!
View the animation of the deployment
& orbit sequence by NGST.
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