James Web Launch

[Streeper541]

Until humans can travel faster than light, we are going nowhere. The closest star is over 4 light years away...

No need for interstellar travel just yet & I don't believe there will EVER be intergalactic travel. We could however start within the solar system right now with the technology we have.

The moon & Mars are easily obtainable goals for colonization. Down the road, outer planet moons such as Titan, Ganymede & Europa could be promising candidates as well. Until then...

It is fun to see NASA back in action again.

It is fun seeing NASA, ESA & CSA working together and doing what they do.

 

[Streeper541]

Cross your fingers gents... the big step starts tomorrow; tensioning the sun shield.

Come on big money.........
No Whammies!

 

[mso489]

I remember how futuristic the film "2001" was in projecting that interplanetary travel would be routine by the year "2001." The computer Hal put the kibosh on that maybe. Not in the film, but in other places, flying cars were seen as imminent. For a time, and maybe still, the U.S. wasn't able to do trips to the international space station but relied on the Russians. The way forward is a difficult road, but maybe these adventures keep the tech sector out of trouble to some degree otherwise.

 

[DanWil84]

I'm excited to. My 7 year old is a galaxy nut and he is very interested in what this telescope does, he says he wants to do something with space when he grows up. I don't know on which channel I saw this documentary, but they allready have seen promising exoplanets. What I'm more interested in is the posibility of live on one of Saturn's moons when the sun turns into a red giant and the earth will a lot less likely be our home. They plan to send a project with a self flying drone with AI, take samples and send the data to earth. I think a mission to Saturn's moons is a lot more reachable than interstellar travel (I love that movie BTW).

 

[sablebrush52]

I've always been fascinated with astronomy and the search for knowledge about the universe. It probably has something to do with my father being an aerospace engineer who worked on life support engineering for the Mercury, Apollo, and Shuttle projects as well as my uncle, who trained the astronauts to do proper sampling on the Moon and who did the primary analysis of the first samples brought back. and who is credited as one of the founders of a branch of science called Exogeology.

 

[woodsroad]

James Webb Space Telescope unfurls sunshield in major post-launch milestone - https://www.foxnews.com/science/james-webb-space-telescope-sunshield-post-launch-milestone

 

[Rockyrepose]

I found this video interesting and helped me understand the deep orbital Lagrange points. Somewhere around 5 minutes in the 3D modeling really helped wrap my head around them.

 

[kcghost]

And they still have a number of "you get one shot at it" activities to go. This is one terribly complicated machine that they have put there. We have over 5-and-half months before we know if it really works.

 

[sablebrush52]

And they still have a number of "you get one shot at it" activities to go. This is one terribly complicated machine that they have put there. We have over 5-and-half months before we know if it really works.

The big question is whether or not the “Eat At Joe’s” sign will light up.

 

[Streeper541]

And they still have a number of "you get one shot at it" activities to go. This is one terribly complicated machine that they have put there. We have over 5-and-half months before we know if it really works.

I know. This whole thing is a nail biter isn't it?

 

[mingc]

The mirrors on the Webb telescope were built by Ball Aerospace. Webb - https://www.ball.com/aerospace/programs/astrophysics/webb. It has a pipe tobacco connection, kinda. If you look at Ball Aerospace's logo, it's exactly the same as the Ball mason jar logo. Yes, they once shared the same parent company: Ball Corporation - Wikipedia - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ball_Corporation. Thank about that next time you pick up a Ball mason jar!

 

[Streeper541]

Great news! Webb is fully deployed!

'We're on an incredible high': James Webb Space Telescope scientists over the moon as observatory unfolds

You'd be thrilled, too, after unfolding a giant space telescope in the most complicated way ever.

www.space.com

 

[sablebrush52]

Great news! Webb is fully deployed!

'We're on an incredible high': James Webb Space Telescope scientists over the moon as observatory unfolds

You'd be thrilled, too, after unfolding a giant space telescope in the most complicated way ever.

www.space.com

So far, so good! They're not quite out of the woods as they still have mirror alignment to do, but things have gone very well indeed!

 

[renfield]

Truly remarkable that so many actuations have gone according to plan. A big hats off to the design, test and evaluation team.

A friend of mine worked on the Webb for several years. He also had the distinction of having survived being hit by lightning 3 times (once directly and twice indirectly). An incredibly resilient guy.

 

[goldenmole]

Cool project and looking forward to the first results coming in once the thing is fully up and running (will be after summer only for the start of the science mission). Of cause the Europeans are a bit miffed when most international press releases do not even mention that this is a collaborative project: not only NASA (in the same way most Americans don't know that the "Pfizer Vaccine" was actually developed by BioNTech in Germany, a small company 5km from my hometown).
Anyway: for those complaining that we spend so much money to look into the stars: there have also been tremendous advances in Satellite imagery of our own planet over the last decades. The most impressive (I am working with that data myself) being the European Sentinel fleet of earth observing satellites with free and open data for everyone Sentinel Online - ESA - Sentinel Online - https://sentinels.copernicus.eu/web/sentinel/home

 

[monty55]

Oh man, this is great! I've been following the WEBB for some time now. So relieved the sun shields and mirrors deployed without issues. L2 here we come!

 

[Streeper541]

Now hear this, now hear this...

As of 14:13:32 EST on MON 24 JAN 2002 the James Webb Space Telescope has officially completed its journey to L2 and has inserted into its orbit! Press conference and updates to follow at 1500! SOOOO EXCITING!

 

[Streeper541]

For those interested, NASA has updated the Where is Webb? site to include a real time 3d orbital map of the universe.

It's pretty nifty. Viewing options include a simulated close up of Webb, the Terran system, the Inner Planets, and the Sol system. Here's a screen shot.