Stardust Status Report

September 19, 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 implementation of Comet Wild 2 encounter sequence test cases has started in the Spacecraft Test Laboratory (STL). The test cases cover various fault protection scenarios.

The Stardust Education and Public Outreach (E/PO) team participated in the NASA-wide Office Of Space Science Forum to coordinate NASA missions and NASA Center themes. The Stardust Principal Investigator, Don Brownlee, spoke to a group of 700 educators at the Challenger Space Center in Peoria, Arizona as part of the Smithsonian National Education and Museum Studies Program.

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