Deep Impact spacecraft comet Tempel

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NASA's Deep Impact spacecraft is out of safe mode and healthy, and on its way to an encounter with comet Tempel 1 on July 4, 2005.

Launched from Cape Canaveral Air Force Station on Wednesday, the Deep Impact spacecraft entered a state called safe mode soon after separation from the launch vehicle. When a spacecraft enters safe mode, all but essential spacecraft systems are turned off until it receives new commands from mission control. When Deep Impact separated from the launch vehicle, the spacecraft computer detected higher than expected temperatures in the propulsion system.

While in the safe mode, the spacecraft successfully executed all mission events associated with commencing space flight operations. Data received from the spacecraft indicate it has deployed and locked its solar panels, is receiving power and achieved proper orientation in space.

"We are out of safe mode and proceeding with in-flight operations," said Deep Impact project manager Rick Grammier of NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory. "We're back on nominal timeline and look forward to our encounter with comet Tempel 1 this summer."

Deep Impact is comprised of two parts, a "fly-by" spacecraft and a smaller "impactor." The impactor will be released into the comet's path for a planned collision on July 4. The crater produced by the impactor is expected to be up to the size of a football stadium and two to 14 stories deep. Ice and dust debris will be ejected from the crater, revealing the material beneath.

The fly-by spacecraft will observe the effects of the collision. NASA's Hubble, Spitzer and Chandra space telescopes, and other telescopes on Earth, will also observe the collision.

Comets are time capsules that hold clues about the formation and evolution of the Solar System. They are composed of ice, gas and dust, primitive debris from the Solar System's distant and coldest regions that formed 4.5 billion years ago.

The management of the Deep Impact launch was the responsibility of NASA's Kennedy Space Center, Fla. Deep Impact was launched from Pad 17-B at Cape Canaveral Air Force Station, Fla. Delta II launch service was provided by Boeing Expendable Launch Systems, Huntington Beach, Calif. The spacecraft was built for NASA by Ball Aerospace and Technologies Corporation, Boulder, Colo. Deep Impact project management is by JPL.

For more information about the mission on the Web, visit nasa.gov/deepimpact or deepimpact.jpl.nasa.gov.

For information about NASA and other agency programs on the Web, visit nasa.gov.
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DC Agle (818) 393-9011 Jet Propulsion Laboratory, Pasadena, Calif.

Gretchen Cook-Anderson (202) 358-0836 Dolores Beasley (202) 358-1753 NASA Headquarters, Washington 01.13.05 RELEASE: 2005-016

2005 Freedom Calendar

January 14, 1975
Republican William T. Coleman nominated as first African-American to be U.S. Secretary of Transportation.

January 15, 1901
Republican Booker T. Washington protests Alabama Democratic Party’s refusal to permit voting by African-Americans.

January 16, 1954
Consuelo Bailey (R-VT) announces her ultimately successful candidacy to become nation’s first woman elected Lt. Governor of a state.

January 17, 1874
Armed Democrats seize Texas state government, ending Republican efforts to racially integrate government

January 18, 1815
Birth of Republican Gov. Richard Yates (R-IL), who prevented Democrat-controlled legislature from withdrawing state troops from the Union Army.

January 19, 1818
Birth of anti-slavery activist Alvan Bovay, who organized first meeting of Republican Party in 1854, to oppose Democrats’ pro-slavery policies,

January 20, 2001
Mississippi Republican Rod Paige is confirmed as first African-American U.S. Secretary of Education; calls for school choice to allow poor and minority children to “throw off their chains”.

SOURCE: 2005 Republican Freedom Calendar