Venus Express Passive Cruise Phase Begins

Credit: ESA.

Paris, France (ESA) Jan 12, 2006
During the reporting period Venus Express has been configured for a passive cruise phase and the only activities conducted on top of the routine ones are the DDOR tests with ESA (NNOCEB) and DSN (GDS-CAN) stations.

The spacecraft behaviour has been nominal throughout the reporting period.

At the end of the last NNO pass in the reporting period (DOY 006, 06:00) Venus Express was 15.5 million km from the Earth, 131.7 million km from the Sun, and 25.5 million km from Venus. The one-way signal travel time was 52 seconds.

Future Milestones

The coming week will mark a "close to inferior conjunction" condition, therefore, no major operations are planned. The actual conjunction condition will be reached on DoY 011 at around 18:00 when the angular distance between the Sun and the spacecraft as seen from the Earth will be approximately 1.6 degrees. No significant impact is foreseen on the RF link.

On DoY 006 a RSI test will take place over New Norcia.

On DoY 008 a passive ASPERA calibration will be conducted via MTL.

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