STEREO-B
STEREO-B — the "Behind" spacecraft of NASA's twin STEREO solar observatories, launched with STEREO-A on 26 October 2006 into an orbit around the Sun that carries it slowly behind Earth. Contact was lost on 1 October 2014 after a series of faults in its attitude control; it was heard again briefly on 21 August 2016, the recovery failed, and NASA ended the attempts on 17 October 2018.
Key facts
Mission & specifications
Mission
- Operator
- NASA
- Launched
- October 26, 2006
- Status
- Lost
Trajectory
- Current speed
- 28.6 km/s
- Computed from the cached state vector
- Distance from the Sun
- 1.06 AU
- Computed from the cached position
- Distance from Earth
- 0.377 AU
- Computed from cached positions
- Distance from Venus
- 0.41 AU
- Computed from cached positions
Mission
STEREO-B was the "Behind" half of NASA's twin STEREO solar observatories, launched with STEREO-A on 26 October 2006. After a lunar flyby put it into an orbit around the Sun that trails Earth, it and its twin watched coronal mass ejections from two directions at once, and on 6 February 2011 the two, then 180° apart, saw the whole Sun at once. On 1 October 2014, after several hardware problems affecting control of its orientation, contact was lost. Twenty-two months later, on 21 August 2016, the Deep Space Network picked up its signal during a monthly search: the spacecraft was spinning uncontrollably at about 3° a second. The recovery attempts failed; the last contact was on 23 September 2016, and NASA ended the periodic attempts on 17 October 2018. JPL still carries a predicted trajectory for it, kept to support the search.
- 2006Launch with STEREO-ALaunch
Two nearly identical observatories on one Delta II.
- 2011The whole Sun at onceMilestone
180° from STEREO-A: between them they see all of the Sun.
- 2014Contact lostMilestone
After hardware problems with its orientation control.
- 2016Heard again, brieflyMilestone
Spinning at about 3° a second; the recovery fails.
- 2018Recovery attempts endMission end
NASA stops its periodic attempts to contact it.
Images
Images from open archives · credit shown per image