Stardust Status Report

September 5, 2003

There was one Deep Space Network (DSN) tracking pass in the past week. Telemetry relayed from the spacecraft indicates it is healthy and all subsystems continue to operate normally.

The Education and Public Outreach team participated in the Annual Challenger Center Nation Conference in Kansas City, Missouri. Forty seven Challenger Centers from throughout the United States were represented including England.

The flight software patch to select images during the Comet Wild 2 encounter was delivered to Spacecraft Test Laboratory (STL) for testing. This patch is expected to provide at least one of the higher resolution nucleus images early in the encounter data playback.

A group of international comet experts has been invited to be part of the Comet Wild 2 Dust Model Peer Review Board.

Information on the present position and orbits of the Stardust spacecraft and Comet Wild 2 may be found on the "Where Is Stardust Right Now?" web page located at:

http://stardust.jpl.nasa.gov/mission/scnow.html

For more information on the Stardust mission -- the first ever comet sample return mission -- please visit the Stardust home page:

http://stardust.jpl.nasa.gov