Diagnosing The Optical State Of The Hubble Space Telescope

A. H. Vaughan. (1991), JBIS, 44, pp.487-494

Refcode: 1991.44.487

Abstract:

As designer of the optics of the JPL/Caltech Wide Field and Planetary Camera [l] (WF/PC-1) in the late 1970s, I, like many others, had a personal investment in the exciting discoveries to be made by NASA’s Hubble Space Telescope (HST). My family and I were among the thousands of onlookers cresting the sand dunes as the long awaited countdown took place at Kennedy Space Center in the early morning of April 12, 1990. The actual launch took place twelve days later, having been postponed beyond the limits of our holiday travel plans by a balky generator aboard the space shuttle Discovery. We had an even better than first-hand view of the launch itself by television in California, in JPL’s von Karman Auditorium, and of the unfolding drama of deployment and release of the “crown jewel of astronomy” into orbit. But with the publication in early June 1990 of the first pictures taken by the HST, it was apparent that the images were not what they should be and the certainty that a major flaw afflicted the orbiting optical system was soon inescapable. Thus began a year-long quest to pinpoint the exact nature of the problem and prescribe a correction.