Hubble's ACS Breaks, Again

The Hubble Space Telescope's (HST) Advanced Camera for Surveys has shut off again. The first time was in June, when I wrote about it here. The AP is still calling the ACS the "main" camera, when it's not (read my earlier rant on that). Now, for someone who worked with the HST, I am not sentimental about it at all. The HST was only supposed to be in orbit for 10 years, and then next generation scopes (bigger, better, lighter) were supposed to go up. But NASA and the NAS got all wobbly, and here we have an aging HST, breaking down. Only 2 out of the 3 gyroscopes work now, power fluctuations are (apparently) more common, and with the HST in orbit, next-gen scopes have been delayed. The Webb scope has been delayed until 2011 for deployment. The HST should have been brought down in 2001 and put up in the Smithsonian, but because of great engineering and sentiment, the HST has extended its life almost twice its planned obsolescence. After NASA's problems with the space shuttle program, having a modular observatory in orbit just isn't in the long-term plans anymore, and I miss the grandiose plans that were drawn up. My old adviser was a consultant on a design planned for a 30 meter aggregate mirror following the orbit of the moon to use it as a dust shield: not going to happen now. It's past time to get the new scopes up and the old scopes deorbited. NASA: please hurry.