The Hubble Space Telescope鈥檚 main camera, the Advanced Camera for Surveys, began taking observations again late on Sunday after it had been offline for nearly two weeks.
The ACS shut itself down on 19 June when it suffered a problem with its low-voltage power supply (see Hubble鈥檚 key camera stops working). But the camera has a backup power supply, and on Friday, NASA engineers sent commands to switch to this system (see NASA attempts to revive Hubble鈥檚 main camera).
The camera sprang back to life that same day, and late on Sunday, it began taking observations again. 鈥淓verything seems normal,鈥� says Bruce Margon, at the Space Telescope Science Institute (STScI) in Maryland, US, which manages Hubble鈥檚 observations.
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Those initial observations were to recalibrate the camera, and the first scientific observations will occur at about 0500 GMT on Tuesday. NASA will continue to split the camera鈥檚 time between calibrations and observing for about a week.
Engineers are still investigating the exact cause of the power supply problem and are expected to issue a report on the cause on 24 July.
The ACS takes one or two dozen observations per week and is the most heavily used instrument on Hubble. The $86 million camera was installed in 2002 during Hubble鈥檚 fourth shuttle servicing mission, and it doubled Hubble鈥檚 existing field of view. It also records information more quickly than the telescope鈥檚 other optical camera, the Wide Field and Planetary Camera 2 (WFPC 2).
