James Webb Space Telescope Damage: How Did It Happen?

The James Webb Space Telescope That just gave the world the deepest view of the universe ever was permanently damaged by asteroid attacks.

News leadership: according to Live ScienceAt least 19 small space rocks have been pelted with at least 19 small space rocks by NASA’s James Webb Space Telescope since its December launch.

• An even larger rock caused irreparable damage to one of the telescope’s 18 gold-plated mirrors.

what are they saying: NASA The news was released about the meteor strike last month, saying she built the telescope to withstand the adversities of space and knew there would be occasional micrometeorite strikes.

• Lee Feinberg, Elements Manager for the Webb Optical Telescope at NASA Goddard, explained The team knew the strike was going to happen at some point, saying, “With Webb’s mirrors exposed to space, we expected that the occasional micrometeorite collision would degrade the telescope’s performance over time.”
• However, the “wreckage was larger than previous launch modeling predicted” and scientists are not sure what long-term effects the damage will have, space mentioned.
• “Each small meteor causes a wavefront degradation of the affected mirror segment, as measured during uniform wavefront sensing,” NASA said. Sky News.
• NASA They describe the incident as an “inevitable opportunity event” and say they will use it as an opportunity to increase their “knowledge of the environment of dust particles in the solar system”.

details: according to Live Science“The US Space Monitoring Network is tracking more than 23,000 pieces of orbital debris larger than the size of a softball,” but millions of smaller pieces pass through space undetected.

• The first picture from JWST last week at a White House event with President Joe Biden and NASA officials, where they provided never-before-seen views of the galaxy, Deseret News mentioned.