NASA’s Hubble telescope has been in a “coma” since going into system failure in late October — however in the present day, the company announced that it’s waking Hubble up. After a number of instrument sync failures that required placing Hubble into secure mode, NASA says the telescope is now functioning as regular, with all 4 lively devices accumulating information. 

On October twenty third, NASA first observed that Hubble’s devices weren’t receiving sync messages from the telescope’s management unit. Communications points continued for a number of days, which led NASA to place the telescope right into a form of secure mode — one thing that takes a very long time to come back out of due to the sensitivity of Hubble’s {hardware}. Rapid energy or temperature adjustments aren’t good for its lifespan, so NASA took its time right here.

This shutdown was the second that was required in 2021, with one other month-long “coma” happening in July to cope with an unrelated difficulty. Given the 31-year-old telescope’s age, it is fully potential that Hubble is nearing the tip of its helpful life in house, however for now NASA expects Hubble to work in tandem with the Webb telescope “well into this decade.” After quite a few delays, the Webb telescope is predicted to lastly launch on December twenty second.