Cassini Significant Events for 01/30/03 - 02/05/03

[Date Prev][Date Next][Thread Prev][Thread Next][Date Index][Thread Index]

 



Cassini Significant Events
for 01/30/03 - 02/05/03

The most recent spacecraft telemetry was acquired from the Goldstone
tracking station on Monday, February 3. The Cassini spacecraft is in an
excellent state of health and is operating normally.  Information on the
present position and speed of the Cassini spacecraft may be found on the
"Present Position" web page located at
http://saturn.jpl.nasa.gov/operations/present-position.cfm .

On-board activities this week included a memory readout of flight
software partitions, and clearing of the ACS high water marks.
Instrument activities included Radio and Plasma Wave High Frequency
Receiver (RPWS) calibrations, RPWS high rate observations, Cosmic Dust
Analyzer (CDA) high voltage test, and uplink and execution of a CDA
flight software checkout mini-sequence.

The Project held the first of two uplink approval meetings for the
Attitude Control Subsystem(ACS) and Command and Data Subsystem (CDS)
flight software uplink and checkout activities. The project approved the
procedures and files for the transfer of the ACS and CDS Flight Software
to the solid-state recorders. Also approved were the procedures and
files for the checkout of the ACS software. A second approval meeting
addressing the CDS checkout procedures will be held in early March.

The Spacecraft Operations Office completed the second Probe Relay
Operational Verification Test, which tests a portion of ground
operations during the probe mission. The third segment of the test will
be delayed to allow the teams to factor in the lessons learned from the
two previous runs.

The Navigation team has released a new Cassini Reference Trajectory
update in support of the Huygens Probe mission.  Changes include
addition of trajectory correction maneuvers (TCM) 19a and 19b.  TCM-21,
which has no deterministic component, achieves both the ascending and
descending ring-plane crossing distances around Saturn orbit insertion
of 158,500 km. Ring plane crossing times and closest approach to Saturn
are approximately 25 seconds earlier, SOI still starts at 1:09:57 UTC
but now ends at 02:46:53 UTC on July 1, 2004. The Titan-b target was
changed slightly to accommodate the new probe mission,  the probe
targeting maneuver (PTM) and Orbit deflection maneuver (ODM) times were
updated, and the PTM now targets to a -65 degree body-fixed probe entry
angle.

The Orbiter Science and Target Working teams delivered Revs 27-29 this
week.  Not included were the T17 and T18 Titan flybys.  These flybys
require thruster usage, so final integration has been deferred until
March/April 2003 when the tools to evaluate thruster consumables are
delivered.

The first merge process has been completed and reports published for
Science Operations Plan implementation of tour sequences S15/S16.  The
next official input port is scheduled for mid-February.

Final images have been generated by the Multi-mission Image Processing
Laboratory from stellar observations performed three weeks ago for
instrument calibration purposes.  There are 49 Imaging Science Subsystem
(ISS) Narrow Angle Camera images and 47 Wide Angle Camera images
processed.  This completes ISS science image activity until after the
conclusion of C36, which focuses on CDS and ACS flight software
checkout.  ISS will be supporting optical navigation engineering tests
during this sequence.

The Instrument Operations Radio Science Subsystem task leader made a
summary presentation at the February NASA Quarterly on the goals and
accomplishments of the second Gravitational Wave Experiment that ended
in mid-January.

All teams and offices supported a Cassini / NASA Quarterly review.

The Instrument Operations team hosted a distributed operations site
Operations Team Lead meeting in conjunction with the January Project
Science Group meeting.  Agenda items included a demo of new Cassini
Information Management System 2.4 capabilities, a tutorial about the new
Real Time Interface Unit (RTIU)/sequence translator, and RTIU/ITL
(Integration and Test Laboratory) bus monitor traffic data capabilities.

The CIRS science team delivered version 2.0 instrument flight software
to the Project Software Library. It will be uplinked to the spacecraft
in several weeks.

Delivery coordination meetings were held to review Radio Science
Subsystem Predicts V1.3, Cassini Information Management System version
2.4, the Cassini Operations Reference Encyclopedia V3.1- containing
flight rules and the telemetry dictionary, and mPLOT v1.l5 - an AACS
plotting tool used by the Kinematic Predictor Tool.

A first cut at how an extended mission might be developed, designed, and
implemented by the project was presented at this week's Mission Planning
Forum.

The Mission Assurance Manager convened the Cassini Risk Teams this
week.  Probe Mission and Facility Instrument identified risks were
discussed and dispositioned by the Risk Management Team.  Risks
identified by the Principal Investigators were dispositioned later in
the week, in conjunction with the ongoing Project Science Group
activities.  All risk items were successfully dispositioned and action
items were assigned for refinements, as necessary.

Last week Cassini Outreach presented current status and near term goals
of the mission's outreach program to team members attending the Project
Science Group Meeting, and Saturn Observation Campaign Members held star
parties in Colorado, Virginia, and the Netherlands.

Cassini is a cooperative project of NASA, the European Space Agency and
the Italian Space Agency. The Jet Propulsion Laboratory, a division of
the California Institute of Technology in Pasadena, Calif., manages the
Cassini mission for NASA's Office of Space Science, Washington, D.C.

Cassini Outreach
Cassini Mission to Saturn and Titan
Jet Propulsion Laboratory
California Institute of Technology
National Aeronautics and Space Administration



---
To unsubscribe from Cassini Spacecraft Updates, send a message to leave-cassini-2357282R@list.jpl.nasa.gov
---
Visit the JPL Cassini home page for more information about the Cassini Project: <http://saturn.jpl.nasa.gov/>


[Index of Archives]     [NASA News]     [JPL Home]     [JPL News]     [NASA KSC]     [NTSB]     [Hot Springs]     [Yosemite Info]     [NASA News]     [Telescopes]

  Powered by Linux