@gwynnion @Kalshann Yes. I worked at NASA/JPL for 20...

@gwynnion @Kalshann Yes. I worked at NASA/JPL for 20 years. We ground out every flaw we could find, but we always knew we couldn’t anticipate everything. The role of on-board fault management is to “Fail operational” if possible, but always “fail safe.” In the most minimal case, keep the antenna pointed at Earth and listen.

Like 22 April at 22:17 | Wall-to-wall | Open on c.im

3 comments

Nowhere Girl

@meltedcheese @Kalshann Right, exactly, because if you lose antenna orientation the mission is dead no matter what.

22 April at 22:22 | Open on mastodon.social

David J. Atkinson #🟦

@Kalshann @gwynnion …maybe. There have been difficult situations where all seemed lost and somebody said, “let’s try this.” For example, maybe another spacecraft could communicate with the one having a problem and act as a relay.

23 April at 1:40 | Open on c.im

gnarf

@gwynnion @meltedcheese @Kalshann I visited a major ground station in Europe once where they managed to rescue a satellite that had a software error in the attitude control system and was tumbling uncontrolled.

They used their 32m dish and continuously sent out the software patch for about a week on highest power until it locked in by chance.

Also got some first-hand reports on how they rescued XMM-Newton in 2008 after the RF antenna switch failed. Really fascinating stuff.

23 April at 6:54 | Open on hachyderm.io