NASA’s James Webb Space Telescope successfully launches. It’s a complicated mission for world’s most powerful telescope

Boston Globe ^ | 25 December 2021 | MARCIA DUNN (AP) via Boston Globe

[Fractal Trader]

The world’s largest and most powerful space telescope rocketed away Saturday on a high-stakes quest to behold light from the first stars and galaxies and scour the universe for hints of life.

NASA's James Webb Space Telescope soared from French Guiana on South America’s northeastern coast, riding a European Ariane rocket into the Christmas morning sky.

The $10 billion observatory hurtled toward its destination 1 million miles (1.6 million kilometers) away, or more than four times beyond the moon. It will take a month to get there and another five months before its infrared eyes are ready to start scanning the cosmos.

First, the telescope’s enormous mirror and sunshield need to unfurl; they were folded origami-style to fit into the rocket's nose cone. Otherwise, the observatory won’t be able to peer back in time 13.7 billion years as anticipated, within a mere 100 million years of the universe-forming Big Bang.

“It’s going to give us a better understanding of our universe and our place in it: who we are, what we are, the search that’s eternal,” NASA Administrator Bill Nelson said earlier this week.

But he cautioned: “When you want a big reward, you have to usually take a big risk.”

Intended as a successor to the aging Hubble Space Telescope, the long-delayed James Webb is named after NASA’s administrator during the 1960s. NASA partnered with the European and Canadian space agencies to build and launch the new 7-ton telescope, with thousands of people from 29 countries working on it since the 1990s.

With the launch falling on Christmas and a global surge in COVID-19 cases, there were fewer spectators at the French Guiana launch site than expected. Nelson bowed out along with a congressional delegation and many contractors who worked on the telescope.

[Cuttnhorse]

Hmmm, we now have a Webb and a Hubbell telescope.

Are the Clinton’s involved somehow??

[oldasrocks]

Waste of money. How many poor people could have been fed with 10 billion dollars?

[Zionist Conspirator]

The promoters will first declare that this conclusively proves that the entire universe is a meaningless coincidence.

Then they'll tell us we need a totalitarian planetary dystopia to save the earth-gxddess and achieve social justice.

[daler]

Or we could’ve paid for ten percent or so of the “Green New Deal.”

Or paid hundreds of thousands in reparations to the families of illegal aliens.

Or built a whole bunch of George Floyd memorials.

I for one have total faith in the fiscal responsibility of the federal government, and in their ability to spend our tax dollars wisely./s

[RandallFlagg]

His job was shooting pictures of the sun.

I hope he didn’t do it the way Galileo did it. With a telescope and his naked eye.

[TonyM]

“ I heard that it will orbit one million miles above the earth.Can they transmit high quality images that far? ”

Yes! They are using the new Apple iPhone 13 Max. Thats why the whole thing cost 10 billion dollars. Nine billion went to Bill Gates to pay for development of the new phone and to support his Depopulation of Planet Earth thru Poison Vaccine Mandate Program.

[cyclotic]

Solar observatory satellite about a million miles away.

[_Jim]

Oh - the James Webb Space Telescope.

I was thinking it was the Web Hubble space telescope (from Clinton days).

[logi_cal869]

There’s always one :)

[USAF1985]

Probably why it’s 10 years late…takes a while to cast and polish new mirrors.

[Nifster]

😉😉

[guest7]

"Where is Web?."

Hillary had him "Whacked..."

Uh, Webb telescope; Hubble telescope; is NASA hiding Clinton evidence in "Deep Space"?

[minnesota_bound]

They left the lens cap on....

[Elsie]

They seem to have done so from Mars, Jupiter, Saturn and Uranus.

[Elsie]

I hate to think if the launch would have been a failure, as 10 billion would have gone down the drain.

OH?

I think that money stays on Earth.

If it failed, then we'd actually SAVE money!

Money that would NOT be spent in the coming years to study the data coming in from it.

[Elsie]

It would be a fascinating mission to punch into an asteroid and then let that asteroid carry the camera to the outer parts of the solar system.

Punch?

Wouldn't a gentle landing be required?

And a soft landing means the speeds are almost identical.

Therefore no asteroid would be needed to 'carry' it anywhere.

[Elsie]

If they could figger a way for the thing to catch COVID, it’d lead the news every night!

[Elsie]

Which one of them?

[Elsie]

...I’m not sure it would survive the trip to L2 in an “unfurled” state.

Huh?

Space is space.

Empty, for the most part.

Now if it's going to need a big rocket motor burn, then you sure do NOT want anything unfurled beforehand!

[Elsie]

There is also the peculiar issue that this telescope operates in the infrared, and requires deep-space cold and shielding from the sun to operate.

So the space around Earth is warmer?