MRO Science Operations Resume

http://www.jpl.nasa.gov/news/news.cfm?release=2009-121

Science Operations Resume
Jet Propulsion Laboratory
August 10, 2009

Mars Recommaissance Orbiter Mission Status Report

PASADENA, Calif. -- NASA's Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter has been
restored
to full operations, making intensive science observations of Mars,
four
days after it unexpectedly switched to its backup computer.

The mission's engineers at NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory, Pasadena,
Calif., and at Lockheed Martin Space Systems, Denver, successfully
transitioned the orbiter out of limited-activity "safe" mode on
Saturday, Aug. 8, and resumed use of the spacecraft's science
instruments on Monday, Aug. 10, at 2:32 p.m. PDT (5:32 p.m. EDT, or
21:32 UTC).

The Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter had spontaneously swapped from its "A"
side computer and subsystems to the redundant "B" side on Aug. 6.
Engineers are investigating the root cause for that event, which bore
some similarities to side swaps by the orbiter in 2007 and 2008.

The spacecraft has been studying Mars with an advanced set of
instruments since 2006. It has returned more data about the planet
than
all other past and current missions to Mars combined.

JPL, a division of the California Institute of Technology in Pasadena,
manages the Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter for NASA's Science Mission
Directorate, Washington. Lockheed Martin Space Systems, Denver, is the
prime contractor for the project and built the spacecraft.

Guy Webster 818-354-6278
Jet Propulsion Laboratory, Pasadena, Calif.


2009-121