Ground controllers have regain communication with WIRE following a tense day when the spacecraft began spinning after suspected frozen hydrogen started venting causing the spacecraft to spin.
WIRE was launched Thursday evening by Orbital highly successful air-drop launcher, Pegasus. After separating, contact was established on its first polar pass over Antarctica.
Soon after WIRE began experiencing problems with the Poker Flats, ground station in Alaska noticing WIRE was still spinning instead of establishing a stable position in orbit and was warmer than expected.
According to Goddard Space Flight Center spokesperson Lynn Jenner, the WIRE team then declared a spacecraft emergency. Communication with the spacecraft was maintained with the team successful in stopping in the spacecraft spin.
"Recovery of the spacecraft is our top priority," said Ken Ledbetter, Director of the Mission and Payload Development Division in the Office of Space Science at NASA Headquarters, Washington, DC.
"The spacecraft carries frozen hydrogen to cool its instrument, and we believe that the hydrogen is venting as it warms up, causing the spacecraft to spin. However, at this time, spacecraft controllers do not know what specifically caused the situation."
A spacecraft recovery team has been formed, headed by David Everett of NASA's Goddard Space Flight Center, Greenbelt, MD. The team will hold an evaluation meeting Saturday morning to assess the situation and determine if the mission can be recovered and to what extent.
Despite several recent problems with small spacecraft, Jenner said NASA's Small Explorer (SMEX) program has been largely trouble free. With the pass five spacecraft in the current series successful missions.
Whether this will hold true for WIRE remains to be known. But the recent spate of small spacecraft problems has also been meet with some spectacular mission recoveries, and there is hope yet for the world's intergalactic astronomers waiting to be wired.
