NASA has ordered the scientific staff of the Hubble Space Telescope to relocate to a temporary operations ledge on the Florida coastline, where they will remain until the observatory's orbit is raised by commercial contractors. The directive, issued on Monday, requires every astronomer, engineer and data analyst on the programme to report to a steel gantry erected overnight at the Kennedy Space Center, where a timetable of twelve-hour shifts has been posted at the gate.
Administrator Jared Isaacman told staff that the agency would leave no reasonable option unexplored. «Hubble still has important science ahead of it, and we are not going to let gravity settle the matter while we are still making phone calls,» he said. Under the plan, private firms bidding for the rescue must demonstrate a full-scale mock boost in a hangar identical to the telescope's orbit, complete with a replica mirror rotated by hand.
Contractors have since flooded the region. Three companies have leased the parking lots of two motels, and a fourth has begun welding a launch frame in a field previously used for cattle. Local schools have adopted a new rule that children may only discuss orbital mechanics during recess, and a bakery on the highway now sells a pastry shaped like a telescope, which it describes as the official snack of the rescue effort.
NASA says the first review board will sit next spring, and that any proposal not containing a working model of a gyroscope will be returned unopened. Staff who have been living on the ledge for nine days have not been permitted to leave until the review is complete.