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September 17, 2007
Scientists Finally Catch Up to Arthur C Clarke's Imagination
Cassini flew within 1,000 miles of Iapetus on Monday and snapped images of its rugged, two-toned surface. As it was sending data back to Earth, it was hit by a cosmic ray that caused a power switch to trip. The spacecraft was not damaged, but had to turn off its instruments and relay only limited information.Mission controllers have since sent commands for Cassini to resume normal transmission and scientists recovered all the data from the moon flyby despite a nearly 12-hour delay. The spacecraft was expected to be fully functional by week's end.
Clarke surprised the Cassini team with a five-minute video played Tuesday during an internal meeting at NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory in Pasadena. Clarke, who lives in Sri Lanka, told scientists he looked forward to viewing photos from the flyby.
(via discovery)
Posted by Groonk at September 17, 2007 01:24 PM | Ministry of Science
