{"id":133332,"date":"2021-12-30T19:24:46","date_gmt":"2021-12-31T03:24:46","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/lifeboat.com\/blog\/2021\/12\/nasa-says-webbs-excess-fuel-likely-to-extend-its-lifetime-expectations"},"modified":"2021-12-30T19:24:46","modified_gmt":"2021-12-31T03:24:46","slug":"nasa-says-webbs-excess-fuel-likely-to-extend-its-lifetime-expectations","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/lifeboat.com\/blog\/2021\/12\/nasa-says-webbs-excess-fuel-likely-to-extend-its-lifetime-expectations","title":{"rendered":"NASA Says Webb\u2019s Excess Fuel Likely to Extend its Lifetime Expectations"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><a class=\"blog-photo\" href=\"https:\/\/lifeboat.com\/blog.images\/nasa-says-webbs-excess-fuel-likely-to-extend-its-lifetime-expectations2.jpg\"><\/a><\/p>\n<p>After a <a href=\"https:\/\/cms.nasa.gov\/press-release\/nasas-webb-telescope-launches-to-see-first-galaxies-distant-worlds\">successful launch<\/a> of NASA\u2019s James Webb Space Telescope Dec. 25, and completion of two <a href=\"https:\/\/blogs.nasa.gov\/webb\/2021\/12\/27\/more-than-you-wanted-to-know-about-webbs-mid-course-corrections\/\">mid-course correction maneuvers<\/a>, the Webb team has analyzed its initial trajectory and determined the observatory should have enough propellant to allow support of science operations in orbit for significantly more than a 10-year science lifetime. (The minimum baseline for the mission is five years.) <\/p>\n<p>The analysis shows that less propellant than originally planned for is needed to correct Webb\u2019s trajectory toward its final orbit around the second Lagrange point known as<a href=\"https:\/\/webb.nasa.gov\/content\/about\/orbit.html\"> L2<\/a>, a point of gravitational balance on the far side of Earth away from the Sun. Consequently, Webb will have much more than the baseline estimate of propellant \u2013 though many factors could ultimately affect Webb\u2019s duration of operation.<\/p>\n<p>Webb has rocket propellant onboard not only for midcourse correction and insertion into orbit around L2, but also for necessary functions during the life of the mission, including \u201cstation keeping\u201d maneuvers \u2013 small thruster burns to adjust Webb\u2019s orbit \u2014 as well as what\u2019s known as momentum management, which maintains Webb\u2019s orientation in space.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>After a successful launch of NASA\u2019s James Webb Space Telescope Dec. 25, and completion of two mid-course correction maneuvers, the Webb team has analyzed its initial trajectory and determined the observatory should have enough propellant to allow support of science operations in orbit for significantly more than a 10-year science lifetime. (The minimum baseline for [\u2026]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":427,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1514],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-133332","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-space-travel"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/lifeboat.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/133332","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/lifeboat.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/lifeboat.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lifeboat.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/427"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lifeboat.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=133332"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/lifeboat.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/133332\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/lifeboat.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=133332"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lifeboat.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=133332"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lifeboat.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=133332"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}