Have you seen my undead satellite?

originally posted by: TEOTWAWKIAIFF
a reply to: InTheLight

They tried the reset in 2007. It was dead for 2 years. The data wasn’t being collected (most likely) and if it was they could not transmit it back. The term used is “lost” but it is not because they could not find it but more like, “lost cause.”

At some point, for some unknown reason, it did reset! The guy looking for the spy satellite finds something. Like stated earlier, there’s lots of stuff up there. He found something but so what, what did he find (he was searching for a spy satellite). He checks other frequencies and the “dead” satellite is showing its ID to anybody passing by! Only he can’t decode the signal. The orbital mechanics tag it as the dead NASA satellite.

Now, they (NASA) are trying to see if they can communicate with it. The tech has changed so much it is difficult to do! And we wait.

Unless you don’t trust NASA to tell the truth!

I have no reason to distrust NASA, do you? My question was, because I know nothing of these types of satellites, does it also save data as well as transmit it?

a reply to: InTheLight

I think that like other space monitoring systems they have a run (they call them “seasons” for some reason). But when the system couldn’t receive more instructions there are fail safe measures that kick in.

This happened to the Juno probe around Saturn. It failed at its task and went “oh, sh#!”then, as a last resort, goes to self preservation. Which is no data gathering, and trying not to spin out of control. The difference here is IMAGE suddenly lost communication from it to the ground. Who knows how much more instructions it had. But fail safe would supersede data gathering.

The processor is only 32-bit so the amount of data that it could keep track of is not like today (probably why they are having problems getting a system up and running). From the NASA site, the data is a bunch of different spectrum photos and frequency analysis. The cool thing is, if they can reactivate it, they can get more data from the instruments that have been silent for years.

What it may have recorded is not as important as getting it recording new readings.

a reply to: TEOTWAWKIAIFF

Thanks for the information, it now will be interesting to see if the IT people can create a link to past tech with new tech.

The software for IMAGE was stored on an old data tape that would be unreadable for any modern hardware. But NASA is a partner (with the ESA) on the Solar and Heliospheric Observatory (SOHO) spacecraft, which has now been in operation for more than 20 years. Thanks to its vintage nature, the SOHO team has a tape drive that can read the four millimeter cassette that holds IMAGE's software.

The data that NASA has read so far suggests that IMAGE's reawakening is even more unexpected than we thought. IMAGE had been built with two sets of redundant hardware (termed A and B), which rescued it back in 2004. Late that year, it suffered a power system reboot; when communication was restored, IMAGE had switched over to the B set of hardware and continued to use that until it dropped communication entirely. Now, IMAGE appears to be back on the A set.

So far, NASA has only checked out the satellite's housekeeping systems. But the agency says that the next step is to attempt to revive the craft's science instruments and determine how many of those are operational. Once it knows what data IMAGE might collect, it'll convene a panel to figure out whether the data can be used to do valuable science on a very small budget.

ArsTechnica.com, Feb. 8, 2018 - NASA confirms: Its undead satellite is operational.

Who said legacy hardware is an issue! Thanks to SOHO they have a system that talks IMAGE.

If they can get some of the instruments back... well the quip that they would have a "very small budget" is also old fashioned! The would have hundreds of thousands on their GoFundMe site!!

Take my money please!!!