Hubble Telescope

Hubble Telescope

The Hubble telescope was named after Edwin P. Hubble, an American astronomer. Hubble is almost the size of a large school bus, but it can fit inside a space shuttle cargo bay. It has a length of 43.5 feet, a weight of 24,500 pounds, and a maximum diameter of 14 feet, but with a top speed of 17,500 miles per hour (5 miles per second), it only takes 97 minutes to complete one complete orbit around Earth.

The Hubble launched April 25, 1990 from the space shuttle Discovery. Its first image was taken May 20, 1990 of a start cluster. It has a mission duration of up to 20 years and has had servicing missions in December 1993, February 1997, December 1999, and February 2002. The Hubble can’t observe the Sun or Mercury because it’s too close to the Sun. The Hubble is sensitive to ultraviolet light. The most frequently observed celestial object is our planet, the Earth because scientists use the observations to make calibrations. The Hubble transmits about 120 gigabytes of science data every week. That's equal to about 3,600 feet of books on a shelf. The growing collection of pictures and data is stored on magneto-optical disks. The Sun is Hubble’s main energy source. It uses 2 twenty-five foot solar panels to use the Sun’s energy. In an average orbit, the Hubble’s power usage is 2,800 watts, which is equivalent to 28 one-hundred