TERRIERS Satellite Enters Recharge Mode

Boston, MA – May 19, 1999

Indications show the AeroAstro/Boston University TERRIERS satellite has entered its recharge mode, awaiting sufficient solar energy to orient properly towards the sun and resume operations. In this mode, the spacecraft recognizes when it has run low on power and puts itself to sleep for sufficient time to allow the batteries to recharge using incident sunlight.

Several passes over the ground station in Boston allowed successful contacts with the spacecraft on Tuesday, downloading over a megabyte of data showing all subsystems to be operating nominally except for Attitude Control. Data indicated the spacecraft was not properly oriented towards the sun. As it was operating on batteries, commands were uplinked to switch between sensors to assist in properly orienting the spacecraft. At the second set of passes Tuesday night, indications were that the spacecraft has most likely entered a sleep mode to recharge the batteries.

"We are now awaiting resumption of communications with the spacecraft," stated Joel Pedlikin, AeroAstro TERRIERS Program Manager. "The team designed the spacecraft with a set of self-executing backup modes for just this contingency, and both Boston University and AeroAstro are taking a variety of measures on the ground to assist in ensuring TERRIERS' mission.

Dr. Rick Fleeter, AeroAstro's President, noted, "This scenario has occurred on numerous ultimately successful spacecraft, from multi-hundred-million dollar missions to low-cost microspacecraft. TERRIERS has confirmed it is operating nominally other than this glitch, for which we have contingency plans, so we're confident the full mission will be a success for the students, scientists, and spacecraft team working in Boston."

TERRIERS (Tomographic Experiment using Radiative Recombinative Ionospheric Extreme ultraviolet and Radio Sources), a 123 kg (272 lbs.) micro-satellite with a bus mass of 75 kg (165 lbs.), was built by AeroAstro in conjunction with students and professionals at Boston University's Center for Space Physics. It is a mission in the Universities Space Research Association (USRA) Student Explorer Demonstration Initiative (STEDI). Its atmospheric science mission is to demonstrate global ionospheric tomography and utilize the technique to study ionospheric/thermospheric processes. The satellite also accommodates a scientific payload developed by students at Cleveland Heights High School and a radio propagation experiment from the Naval Research Lab.

AeroAstro, a pioneer of micro-spacecraft applications in science, remote sensing, and communications, is a leader in innovative small satellite applications. It led the trend towards "smaller, better, cheaper, faster" spacecraft ™ that is now NASA's mantra ™ with its highly successful ALEXIS satellite begun in 1988 and currently in its seventh year operating on-orbit.

AeroAstro has since designed, constructed, tested and supported the launch of several other satellites, as well as completing numerous spacecraft systems programs and manufacturing low-cost small rocket engines, nano-satellites the size of a textbook, and a variety of spacecraft components. NASA, the Air Force, and commercial and university customers have all employed AeroAstro in its 11-year history.