As NASA continues to deal with shrinking budgets and loss of funding, the ISEE-3 Reboot Project could be a preview of where space and satellite research is headed.
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Almost 36 years ago, NASA launched the International Cometary Explorer (more commonly referred to as the ISEE-3) into orbit. The satellite is notable, as it became the first man-made object to ever pass through the tail of a comet after encountering Comet Giacobini-Zinner in 1983.
NASA lost contact with the satellite in 1998, but earlier this year, a group of people expressed interest in reestablishing communications with the spacecraft.
After raising almost $160,000 through a crowdfunding campaign, the group, dubbed the ISEE-3 Reboot Project, set out to construct the necessary infrastructure to once again communicate with the Explorer.
According to Gizmodo, the team managed to establish two-way communication with ISEE-3 at a Puerto Rican observatory, making them the first group of amateurs to successfully link up with a decommissioned spacecraft. In a statement, the Reboot team says:
Over the coming days and weeks our team will make an assessment of the spacecraft’s overall health and refine the techniques required to fire its engines and bring it back to an orbit near Earth.
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As NASA continues to deal with shrinking budgets and loss of funding, the ISEE-3 Reboot Project could be a preview of where space and satellite research is headed.
via Gizmodo, Photo Courtesy: Twitter
This post originally appeared at Elite Daily. Reprinted with permission.
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CONNOR TOOLE graduated from Boston College, where he spent most of his time writing things on the internet while majoring in a topic he didn’t realize he hated until he had all of the necessary credits. Standing at 6′ 10″, he is required by Giant Law to utter “Fee-fi-fo-fum” whenever someone asks him to. His interests include Mark Ruffalo.