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we're locked and we're going to send

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that command

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31 minutes and 32 seconds for our

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support

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[Music]

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since the retirement of the space

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shuttle the engineering team is

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absolutely critical for hubble

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it always has been without the shuttle

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going up to replace any equipment

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failures that we have we have to make do

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with what we have

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what we really are concentrating on is

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just keeping the telescope working and

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keep the science going

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and everything looks excellent and we

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have no reason not to expect that hubble

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will last until the late 2020s and

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beyond

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my name is mike wins and i'm the lead

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systems engineer for what's known as the

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optical telescope assembly of the hubble

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space telescope i'm in charge of what's

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known as defined guidance sensors these

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are the instruments that actually help

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hubble do the exquisite and precise

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pointing that it does

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right now we're getting ready to perform

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an observation telescope is going to be

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trying to go to acquire some guide stars

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in just a few minutes here the stock is

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the space telescope operations control

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center where we send commands to the

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spacecraft

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on a daily basis we have to send up

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what's known as command loads except the

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dtmr is good step three is complete

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because the computers on hubble are very

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old and they have very little memory in

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fact most of your memory sticks today

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are 20 30 100 times bigger than hubble

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we have to send up essentially a load of

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all the commands hubble's going to be

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doing for the next 24 hours

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on a routine basis we always keep 24

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hours of instructions on board so it's

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routinely updating for the new sequence

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24 hours in advance we'll start with

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doing our thermostat blink

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hubble is always working it's always

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doing something it's always

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doing some sort of observation or

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calibration or getting ready for the

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next task we'll be logging on board at

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14 33 17. hubble is truly a 24 7 365 day

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a year instrument so the hubble can keep

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on going it never stops and we are

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configured it's been verified

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now we do have to because of this low

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earth orbit we're in the actual

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observations when we're taking a picture

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of something we're doing a science

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observation we actually have to wait

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because sometimes the earth gets in the

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way so we have to pause wait until the

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earth gets out of the way as we go back

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around and start the observation back up

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you have constraints you don't want the

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optics pointing at the sun and you don't

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want the instruments to have their

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shutters open when you're looking at the

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earth because the earth is bright for

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them and then we have the south atlantic

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anomaly the saa which is a portion of

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the earth

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where we get proton hits that will

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affect the electronics in hubble and can

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also affect the instruments in hubble

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and so we have to plan out very

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carefully our targets and observations

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we have a timeline that's laid out to

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maximize the efficiency of it

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hubble can actually take observations

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during day and night passes every 95

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minutes we go around the earth the

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batteries will charge from the solar

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arrays during the day pass and then at

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night batteries power the observatory so

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we can continue observing

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the scheduling with hubble we're trying

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to put it together as efficiently as

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possible minimize our gaps the goal is

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to constantly keep it busy

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we're constrained to a certain extent

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but whenever we have visibility we are

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observing

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the demand for use of the hubble space

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telescope from scientists around the

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world is very high

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hubble it's at its most productive it's

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got some of the best instruments that

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have ever been aboard it there's a very

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high demand of olds performing

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exceptionally well two

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one

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and liftoff of space shuttle atlantis

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final visit to enhance the vision of

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hubble into the deepest grandeur of our

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universe since the final space shuttle

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servicing mission we're using hubble to

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get the best kind of science return we

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can from the suite of instruments that

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we have so our focus now is on making

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sure we get the best science while it's

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still operating so well

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luckily at the end of the last servicing

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mission we were actually left with

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telescope in great condition but hubble

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is getting older and older it's a very

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old telescope

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now ten years after the last servicing

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mission

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fix things so we have to rely upon our

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own ingenuity to be able to figure out

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if something does fail what are the

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alternative paths that we have

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for the telescope to keep giving us this

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peak science we need lots of things to

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be working together very well on the

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telescope we need a pointing accuracy

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system that is outstanding and keeping

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that whole system healthy and

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functioning so that we can point hubble

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very accurately even while it's whizzing

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around earth in its

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orbit for the telescope to be able to do

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the science it needs to do we have to

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hold it very very steady

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there is actually a little bit of motion

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i mean it's hard we're zooming around

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the earth at 17 000 miles an hour so

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it's hard to hold the telescope

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perfectly like that the gyros are

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working really good the gyroscopes can

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sense motion

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in each direction and so because of the

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gyroscopes that we have on board and how

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sensitive they are in terms of sensing

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motion that we can keep our cameras

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steady gyros are very good at measuring

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these very small rates the fine guidance

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sensors are actually sort of used i

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always like to describe it as backseat

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drivers and they constantly tap on the

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gyro's shoulders about once a second

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they keep saying turn left a little bit

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right a little bit left a little bit

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right i mean it must be driving the

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driver was nuts

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so to find guidance sensors allow you

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that really fine control but actually

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it's the gyroscopes

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driving the telescope and they're doing

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a perfectly good job here everything

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looks good where our star is the right

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brightness the reason that is because we

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need to make sure we have to correct the

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guide stars one of the things we look at

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is the brightness is and that's what

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we're measuring here those are about

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right for what the stars were but also

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we wanted to make sure they were exactly

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as far apart as we thought they were

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going to be and it did it did a check

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and it passed a very very tight

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tolerance check to make sure that those

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were the right stars so we know we're

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locked up on the stars we've got a good

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lock here the gyroscopes are very

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critical because be able to move from

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one position to another position the

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gyroscopes are the only thing that can

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tell us how we can do that

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we have six gyroscopes on board hubble

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currently three of them are still

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working and three is sort of what people

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used to think of as the minimum number

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but we have developed a science mode

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where we only need one gyro

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a big part of our job is to make sure

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that we can extend the life of hubble

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and continue doing the high performance

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science that we're doing for many more

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years

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what we've done is we've gone through

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all the critical components of hubble

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and said how can we potentially make

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them last longer as you might do with

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your own cars it's getting more miles on

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it the gyroscopes have been our most

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problematic piece of hardware so i

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helped

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lead an effort to develop a two gyro

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science mode

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and we were able to use that mode on

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orbit and be able to perform science

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and then learning from that we actually

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developed a one gyro science mode that

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we've been able to test on orbit but we

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haven't been called on to use but in the

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end possibly five to ten to fifteen

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years from now when we're down to

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potentially our last gyroscope that is

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the mode we'll be in

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before we do anything on orbit for the

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first time we have to test it out on the

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ground and we're very lucky to have what

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we call the vest the vehicle electrical

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system test facility and the key with

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the vehicle electrical system test

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facility is it's an exact copy of the

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main part of the telescope where all the

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electronics are and it has the

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mechanical bays it has the computers the

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electronic box is installed in there and

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it has the cables and harnesses in there

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and in fact when we were building the

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vest we had the quality engineers came

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to us and said you're not doing these

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cables exactly the way you should be

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doing them you know we've got better

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standards now and our thing was we're

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trying to build a copy of what we have

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on orbit and so what you have in the

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vest is an exact electrical copy of the

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hubble space telescope

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every orbit as we come around the earth

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to be able to get our attitude correct

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to get ourselves steady and locked on

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the fine guidance sensors and the

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gyroscopes are key to that and that's

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why those are the two of the subsystems

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that are on the top of our list as far

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as having contingency plans for and

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monitoring the health and safety of

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those and making sure we have them in

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peak performance

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when something fails on hubble or we

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have an anomaly something we don't

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understand one of my jobs is to bring

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together the experts which may be a

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thermal engineer a mechanical engineer

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an electrical engineer software engineer

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all these different people and we'll say

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you know how do we deal with this issue

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and how can we work around it and return

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back to peak science what you do is you

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come up with a list of what is available

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to you on the telescope in terms of

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potential i could close this relay or

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open that relay or turn on this box and

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i am continually amazed you have a

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telescope on orbit that you can't even

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see and all you're doing is looking at

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the data coming down to you from the

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ground

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these experts are able to use their

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ingenuity and come up with ways to

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continue to operate hubble and

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everything looks excellent and we have

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no reason not to expect that hubble will

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i personally am extremely grateful to

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the hubble operations team these people

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who work day and night to keep hubble

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operating

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providing exquisite science return

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giving us the information that we need

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to know how hubble's doing is it doing

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the kind of accurate pointing that we

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need is it getting the sensitivity in

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the various wavelengths of light in the

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various instruments that we need to have

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to do the science are we able to

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calibrate those observations in an

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accurate way we couldn't do any of those

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scientific analyses if we didn't have

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this team of operations experts behind

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the scenes making sure

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that the details of hubble's technical

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operations are being monitored being

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handled being managed being planned

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in