Live Update
From the Liveblog of
Tuesday, January 4, 2022
Webb telescope fully deploys sunshield in mission milestone: NASA
The James Webb Space Telescope has fully deployed its five-layer sunshield, a critical milestone for the success of its mission to study every phase of cosmic history, US space agency NASA says.
“All five layers of the sunshield are fully tensioned,” according to an announcer at the telescope’s mission control team in Baltimore, to cheers from team members.
This is it: we’ve just wrapped up one of the most challenging steps of our journey to #UnfoldTheUniverse.
With all five layers of sunshield tensioning complete, about 75% of our 344 single-point failures have been retired! pic.twitter.com/P9jJhu7bJX
— NASA Webb Telescope (@NASAWebb) January 4, 2022