Major glitch hits Hubble telescope

A GLITCH in the Hubble telescope has shut down the imaging spectrograph system. The instrument provides data in the high resolution UV spectrum, such as black hole masses.

It's unclear so far whether the problem can be fixed or not.

According to this web site, the space telescope imaging spectrograph (STIS) stopped after suffering a failed command echo check, and appears to be due to a failed inductor.

STIS is still in suspend mode, with scientists analysing the problem and seeing if there's a way to fix it. Other instruments in the Hubble Space Telescope appear to be functioning normally.

There's some more discussion on this topic on the Bad Astronomy web site. µ

L'INQ
Hubble site