The James Webb Space Telescope has a sun shield pallet deployed. The image is from NASA.
NASA's massive new space observatory has entered its most perilous phase yet as it begins the careful process of unfurling its delicate sun shield.
The James Webb Space Telescope is a revolutionary new observatory that will study the universe in a new way. It has to survive a monthlong trek out to its final post and a carefully choreographed deployment process.
The forward unitized pallet structure of the sun shield was unfurled on Tuesday, according to a NASA statement. The process took four hours to complete. According to the agency, the time is 1805 GMT. The AftUPS will mimic that process.
NASA's James Webb Space Telescope mission is live.
The Christmas launch of NASA's James Webb Space Telescope.
NASA officials wrote that unfolding the forwardUPS included dozens of individual steps. The first step in the process of preparing the sun shield is the successful maneuver.
The process is expected to finish around January 3, although each stage of the deployment sequence is controlled from the ground.
After unfolding the two structures, the next step is to unfurl the sun shield.
The observatory will be in its final configuration within a month of launch. The point on the side opposite the sun is called L2 and it's located nearly a million miles away from Earth. This location is crucial for allowing the instruments to gather data.
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