All satellite and instrument systems continue to perform normally. The Mission Operations team successfully completed a number of Attitude Control System (ACS) calibration maneuvers, which involve pointing the spacecraft in different orientations to ensure that the spacecraft can point the instruments in the various positions needed for data collection, and solar and lunar calibration reference checks.
The ground system has also been put through its paces. After receiving test data, the Landsat Ground Station in Sioux Falls, S.D., successfully replaced an incorrect cable in their system for receiving telemetry. The system for sending commands and receiving telemetry is now fully redundant. The Svalbard Ground Station, located in northern Norway, tested its S-band telemetry link to the Mission Operations Center and LDCM with normal results. The link transfers data at 1.0 Mbps.
Instrument check-out continues to go well. The TIRS cryocooler, which will maintain the operating temperature of the sensors at 43 kelvins (-382 F), was successfully deployed from its launch position. For OLI, the team successfully loaded the OLI pixel map, which optimizes performance. The instruments are not yet imaging Earth.
Throughout, more test pattern data has been generated and transmitted to the Data Processing and Archive System in Sioux Falls, S.D. As of Feb. 26, 104 test pattern images have been processed.
Because the Atlas rocket and Centaur upper stage placed LDCM within its optimal preliminary orbit, the Mission Operations team did not have to do an inclination adjust maneuver/burn, which was planned to correct LDCM's orbit after launch. This saved the mission 12 kilograms of fuel, an amount equal to the fuel needed to maintain the nominal LDCM orbit for two to three years.
- NASA
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