But NASA’s Deep Space Network, which sends commands and receives data from spacecraft across the solar system, was receiving telemetry from SLIM or one of the tiny rovers – or both – an hour after landing.
At the post-landing news conference, JAXA officials confirmed flight controllers were receiving telemetry from both SLIM and LEV-1, which was designed to beam data directly back to Earth. LEV-2 relays data back through SLIM.
“We do consider LEV-1 and LEV-2 to have been successfully separated, and we are making an effort to acquire data at this point in time,” said Kuninaka.
It sucks but at least they’re able to deploy both mini rovers, so maybe the mission is mostly successful? No idea what those mini rovers are capable of though, their project website seems to be available only in japanese: https://www.isas.jaxa.jp/home/slim/SLIM/index.html
That’s good news, it’s also possible last I heard that it is upside down solar panels are facing east instead of the intended west, which would mean that it might come back up once the sun has moved across the sky in a week or so.
It sucks but at least they’re able to deploy both mini rovers, so maybe the mission is mostly successful? No idea what those mini rovers are capable of though, their project website seems to be available only in japanese: https://www.isas.jaxa.jp/home/slim/SLIM/index.html
They even have a VR video, an AR 3d model, and a web game on their website: https://www.isas.jaxa.jp/home/slim/SLIM/gallery/index.html
That’s good news, it’s also possible last I heard that it is upside down solar panels are facing east instead of the intended west, which would mean that it might come back up once the sun has moved across the sky in a week or so.
As mentioned, LEV 2 relays data through SLIM which means a dead SLIM is a dead LEV 2