No. 162 - Start of Quadrature Phase24 Dec 2008 14:54 Report for Period 14 December to 20 December 2008 The Venus Express spacecraft entered nominally in the quadrature phase - the period during which the Sun-Spacecraft-Earth angle is between 75° and 95°. During the quadrature phase revised operating constraints on the VMC lead to the necessity for changing the spacecraft attitude to prevent unacceptable illumination of the VMC. To achieve this attitude fake ephemerides on the positions of the spacecraft and the Earth are uploaded to Venus Express. The first tilted communications pass was on 19 December 2008.
Later in the quadrature phase a swap to high gain antenna 2 (HGA2) is required for Earth communications, as the spacecraft attitude for continuing the use of HGA1 would result in illumination of spacecraft faces not designed to cope with such exposure. Nominal operations were conducted during the reporting period. VIRTIS continues to be operated in the visual channels only. Radio Science Investigation (RSI) occultation measurements were taken during three ground station passes in the reporting period. The table below shows a chronology of the main activities:
At the end of the last Cebreros pass in the reporting period (DOY 355) Venus Express was orbiting Venus at 130.74 million km from the Earth. The one-way signal travel time was 435.8 seconds. Payload ActivitiesASPERA MAG PFS SPICAV VeRA VIRTIS VMC Future Milestones
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Last Update: 05 Feb 2009
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