Wednesday January 21st 2009

Days seem to be moving forward fast. As of today there are just 85 days to launch. However, as there is still another Ariane 5 launch, on February 12th, before ours, our April 16^th date is officially only a target date. Obviously, our launch date cannot be confirmed until the previous launch has been made successfully. There is excitement that launch is so close. There is also a sober realisation that there is still so much to do before launch.

There are many veterans in the group who have worked in previous missions such as XMM, ISO and, even, in a few cases, IUE. These people have the advantage that they have gone through this before and can compare where we are compared to previous missions. The unanimous view is that compared to any previous mission we are way ahead of where they were at this same stage before launch. That though is not exactly a cause for complacency: in fact, quite the opposite. Perfection is unattainable, but there is a grim determination, at very least, to limit our imperfections as much as possible. What this means in practice is to look at all the issues that have been raised through the test – some major, many minor, a lot trivial – and to prioritise them carefully: what MUST be fixed before launch? What things are important (i.e. must be fixed), but not urgent (they can be fixed after launch with no impact on the early stages of the mission)? What things would be nice to do, but are in no way urgent or important? Deadlines concentrate minds wonderfully and we are approaching the biggest one of all, so focussing efforts as carefully as possible is a priority.