EO-1 continues to operate nominally and collect images, averaging around five to six per day in support of the Science Validation Team. Validation of the other technologies continues to proceed nominally. An EO-1 Technology Validation and Infusion Workshop is scheduled for August 15-16, 2001in the Washington, D.C. area.

EO-1 successfully performed its first autonomous formation flying maneuver on May 17th utilizing the GSFC developed Folta/Quinn formation flying algorithm. The maneuver planned and executed on board the spacecraft was performed to maintain a one minute separation and allow both missions to image the same ground for cross comparison purposes.  

EO-1 continues to function nominally. On April 23, 2001, EO-1 took its 1,000th data collection event (image). During late March and April, some special calibration scenes of deep space targets (Jupiter, Venus, Pleades) were collected to help assess spectral and spatial performance of the instruments. At this time, calibration and performance scenes for all three instruments have been fully collected. Preliminary results of the analyses on the scenes presented at the EO-1 Instrument and Science Validation Team meeting in Tuscon, Arizona on May 1-2, 2001, indicate that all three instruments are performing as specified.

EO-1 continues to perform nominally collecting on average 50 calibration (lunar, solar, earth limb scans) and ground images weekly. The field campaigns in Australia and Argentina are winding down as are the ground data collections required for instrument performance. At this time, the majority of scene requests are being performed for the benefit of Science Validation Team selected from the NASA Research Announcement last year. Their goal will be to fully validate EO-1 with paired scenes from Landsat to determine if the ALI, Hyperion and LAC can meet future science research and application objectives.

EO-1 continues to operate nominally and has taken over 350 images (included calibrations) since launch. The X-band downlink problems experienced in December and early January were all traced to either misconfiguration or equipment problems at the ground stations. Since mid January we have achieved almost perfect downlink results demonstrating that the X-band Phased Array Antenna is operating as specified. Also, the software patch to bypass the Hyperion cryocooler sensor failure has been uploaded to the spacecraft and is working well. This patch will allow the SWIR on Hyperion to operate at a greater duty cycle (80% vs 50% on time).

EO-1 has taken approximately 300 images from its three instruments since launch on Nov 21st. Previously reported problems with X-band down-links were traced primarily to problems with ground station configuration or ground station equipment problems. These problems have been resolved for the most part, and we have been obtaining excellent X-band downlinks from the X-band phased array antenna since the early part of January.

Many members of the EO-1 Technology and Science Team have been receiving inquiries about instrument specifications, performance and availability of imagery. A forum will be held on January 11, 2001 in Reston, Virginia at USGS which should answer most or all of these inquiries. Visit our EO-1 Technology Transfer and Infusion page for more details. Please contact the listed web sites to register.

EO-1 continues to perform nominally. On Friday 12/15, the last two Delta V burns were performed to achieve formation flying with Landsat 7. Over the last week or so we had imaged about 4 to 5 scenes per day. The primary objective in taking these initial images was for calibration and performance measurement of the 3 imaging instruments. As of December 21st, about 75 images have been collected with at least one image from each continent. Validation of the other technologies (Carbon Carbon Radiator, XPAA, LFSA) is ongoing and all are technologies are performing nominally.

The EO-1 Spacecraft and Instrument continue to perform nominally this week. Over the last week, we have taken about 17 images over 6 continents using concurrent imaging from all three instruments. Downlinks via the X-band communication system have been successful in downlinking all images to the ground stations. However, there have been a significant number of passes with poor quality. During this week, the Communication Team performed a number of ground station and spacecraft tests to better characterize the X-band downlinks. These activities should increase downlink success rate significantly next week.

Over the last three days we have been very busy. On Monday afternoon we took our first test Hyperion image which is being analyzed by the Hyperion team. On Tuesday we performed a major delta v burn to continue our approach to formation flying with Landsat 7. On Wednesday we performed a checkout of the Hyperion cryo-cooler which functioned nominally. Thursday was again devoted to another delta v maneuver while today is dedicated to taking the first two engineering scenes which involve simultaneous imaging of all three instruments. We expect to receive tape data with these two scenes by Monday, Dec 4. The rest of this weekend we will be similarly taking test engineering images from all three instruments and relaying them to the ground stations via X-band playbacks from the WARP. Additionally, the LFSA was deployed successfully on Wednesday.

A lot of activity occurred over the last two days. On Saturday the Advanced Land Imager was activated and we took the first engineering images which have been downlinked to the ground for analysis. On Sunday, EO-1 first major inclination delta v burn took place which will begin the move towards formation flying with Landsat 7. On Sunday evening the Atmospheric Corrector was turned on and a engineering image was taken and downlinked to the ground. All indications are that both engineering images show the instruments working nominally. Today, we are in the process of activating the Hyperion instrument and will be taking an engineering test image later this evening.

EO-1 successfully completed its first delta v calibration burn yesterday and activated two of its major technologies. The Wideband Advanced Recorder Processor used to record, store and provide high rate downlink of the EO-1 instrument data was successfully brought on line and tested with the other major communication technology the X-band Phased Array Antenna. Yesterday morning the Enhanced Formation Flying software was initiated and began running on the S/C processor successfully. Once we achieve initial formation flying with Landsat 7 (around Dec 15) it will be used to maintain the orbits of EO-1 with respect to Landsat autonomously. Today (11/25) we will be activating the Advanced Land Imager and taking initial engineering test images.

EO-1 is now pointing its instruments at the Earth and successfully completed yesterday a critical test of its safehold mode logic which is used to safe the spacecraft in case of problems onboard or errant operations or commands. We are testing the ability of the spacecraft to slew or maneuver in all three axis (roll, pitch and yaw). This should be completed by early evening. This evening we will put the Enhanced Formation Flying (EFF) software in monitor mode to see if it is properly calculating navigation information. Overtime, confidence in the EFF software will lead to EO-1 performing autonomous navigation maneuvers to maintain its formation flying with Landsat 7 tomorrow, EO-1 will test its first propulsion system burn (a sec test burn) in preparation for manuevers over the next 2 weeks to get into initial formaiton flying with Landsat 7.