Hello Space Fans and welcome to another edition of Space Fan News.
In this episode, as I'm sure you know by now, the partial government shutdown has affected
NASA employees.
Many are at home waiting for it to end, but will this shutdown cause delays for major
astronomy missions like JWST?
What about TESS and Juno?
Stick around.
OK well as of today we're about three weeks into a partial government shutdown.
Since most democracies in the world use a form parlimentary system, it may seem strange
to you that a government can shut down.
Well, here in the United States, our system seems particularly prone to them.
Shutdowns like this are one reason why I left the Space Telescope Science Institute, a contractor
for NASA that runs the Hubble Space Telescope and will operate the James Webb Space Telescope
when it is launched.
While the Insititute is not shut down for now, many of my friends at NASA are sitting
at home right now.
This is happening during one of the most important times of the year for space astronomy: this
week is the Winter meeting of the American Astronomical Society, a meeting that has seen
hundreds of no shows because of the shutdown.
The AAS estimates that about 10 to 15 percent of its expected 3,200 registrants would not
be able to attend the meeting, because of the shutdown.
So I got to thinking, will this shutdown affect mission schedules?
Will those space telescopes that are being planned and designed right now be delayed?
What about things that are up there like TESS and Juno?
Well as I've reported many times in SFN, JWST is being built by Northrop Grumman, a
defense contractor with a cost plus contract which insulates the company from any cost
overruns.
If things take longer and cost more money, NASA (i.e. the Taxpayer) foots the bill.
And since the role NASA played in building JWST was completed last year, the rest is
up to Northrop to finish, which I'm assuming means it has its money.
According to Ken Sembach, the director of STScI, the shutdown is not further delaying
work on the mission.
As things stand now, the launch for JWST will still be in early 2021, two full years away
from this March.
So what about TESS?
Is it still OK?
According to George Ricker, principal investigator for the mission at the Massachusetts Institute
of Technology, the spacecraft is continuing to collect data despite the government shutdown.
NASA's shutdown plan calls for operations of spacecraft already in space to continue
during the shutdown as part of its requirement to protect property and life.
So good TESS is still working, and from that statement on the NASA shutdown plan, it seems
the other spacecraft, like Juno, are all still being operated as well.
One thing that might affect TESS is planning for an extended mission may be delayed.
If you'll recall from previous SFN's on TESS, the spacecraft will survey the entire
sky for two years, divided up into sectors that it looks at for about two months each.
An extended mission would allow for more data to be collected from each sector which would
increase the number of possible exoplanet candidates that TESS will find and it will
provide more detailed light curves of those it did find during the standard survey.
So it looks like for now, the NASA missions being operated currently are OK.
And those that are operated by non-NASA entities, like JPL and Johns Hopkins APL, are still
going strong.
Remember over New Years that OSIRIS-Rex entered orbit around Bennu and New Horizons flew by
Ultima Thule, so the human adventure continues!
Well that's it for this episode Space Fans.
I want to announce a special offer to Patreon Patrons later this month, so stay tuned for
that announcement.
SFN is made possible by OPT Telescopes, a world leader in telescopes and accessories
for both amateurs and professional astronomers and by Deep Astronomy Patreon Patrons.
Look for our first mini-lecture this Monday at 7pm ET.
The topic will be Dark Matter.
Thanks to all of you for watching and as always, Keep Looking Up!
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