Launched by NASA in 1990, Hubble is an unmanned satellite responsible for transmitting a large telescope.
According to communications in the past by the US space agency, the telescope was supposed to remain active until the end of this decade. However, NASA has just revealed that it actually intends to extend Hubble’s life even further, and to that end, it has partnered with SpaceX to study a way to achieve that goal.
The telescope was, until now, the responsibility of NASA, which actually made several repairs and improvements between 1993 and 2009, in order to maintain its longevity as much as possible. Now, with SpaceX’s intervention, it is believed that Hubble could continue its work for much longer than expected.
This novelty comes directly from NASA’s website, which on its website has officially made its partnership with SpaceX, with the goal of studying the possibility of allowing the implementation of SpaceX and Polaris, whose goal will be to push Hubble into a higher orbit by using the Dragon spacecraft. One of the main advantages of this project is that it will not involve any investment from the government.
Hubble is a very special piece of equipment of great importance, for more than 30 years it has been one of those that has brought us the most information about the universe, and has been operating in orbit for the past few decades at more than 500 kilometers from the planet. Earth.
However, the distance from this orbit has been decreasing over the years, which is detrimental to the quality and quantity of information captured, and will eventually disrupt it. So, what SpaceX is proposing is, exactly, to help combat atmospheric resistance that is gradually deteriorating, thus allowing the telescope to regain a more favorable orbit.
source: NASA
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