No. 174 - Mission Update
Due to maintenance on the Cebreros ground station, two communication passes on 10 and 11 March were shortened, starting later than usual. The maintenance was required to fully return the ground station to its optimal status after a failure last month of the four servos that move the antenna dish (see report no. 169).
The successful installation of two servos that replace two old ones, which were removed earlier, means all four servos are now in place again. This makes the ground station more stable, especially against strong winds. The previous instruction for stopping the station during winds of 10 ms-1 therefore no longer applies.
The table below shows a chronology of the main activities:
| MET (Day) |
Date | DOY | Main Activity |
| 1216 | 08/03/09 | 067 |
Communications pass over Cebreros |
| 1217 | 09/03/09 | 068 |
Communications pass over Cebreros |
| 1218 | 10/03/09 | 069 |
Cebreros maintenance. |
| 1219 | 11/03/09 | 070 |
Telemetry bitrate increased to 182 kbps before the pass. |
| 1220 | 12/03/09 | 071 |
Communications pass over Cebreros |
| 1221 | 13/03/09 | 072 |
Communications pass over Cebreros |
| 1222 | 14/03/09 | 073 |
Communications pass over Cebreros |
At the end of the last Cebreros pass in the reporting period (DOY 073) Venus Express was orbiting Venus at 45.5 million km from the Earth. The one-way signal travel time was 151.8 seconds.
Payload Activities
ASPERA
The instrument was regularly operated as part of the routine plan.
MAG
The instrument was regularly operated as part of the routine plan.
PFS
The instrument was not operated during the reporting period.
SPICAV
The instrument was regularly operated as part of the routine plan.
VeRA
No measurements were taken during the reporting period.
VIRTIS
VIRTIS-M was operated in the visual channels only.
VMC
The instrument was regularly operated as part of the routine plan.
Future Milestones
- Preparation for next gravity observation campaign with the Canberra ground station CAN43 on 15 April 2009.
- Battery Deep Discharge Test is planned for 22 April 2009.
- Start of next (outbound) quadrature phase on 29 May 2009.
- Swap of high gain antenna (HGA) from HGA2 to HGA1 on 8 June 2009.
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Legal disclaimer
This report is based on the ESOC mission operations report, MOR #174. Please see the copyright section of the legal disclaimer (bottom of this page) for terms of use.