NASA to Launch Spacecraft to Raise Swift Observatory and Prevent Orbital Decay

NASA will launch a $30 million mission as early as Tuesday to raise the Swift Observatory to a higher orbit. The observatory, launched in 2004, has been losing altitude faster than expected because of recent higher-than-usual solar activity and is projected to reach a critical 185-mile threshold in October. Katalyst Space Technologies built the three-armed Link spacecraft for the mission.

The robot will launch from an atoll in the Pacific’s Marshall Islands aboard a plane-launched Pegasus rocket and will take roughly one month to rendezvous with Swift before spending another two months lifting the observatory. Swift currently orbits at 224 miles. It must remain above 185 miles for the boost to succeed.

The observatory carries three specialized telescopes and was designed to detect gamma ray bursts, serving as an early-warning system that directs the James Webb Space Telescope toward those events. “This is the first American space robot to go up and do anything like this,” Katalyst CEO Ghonhee Lee said. “NASA has all these big senior observatories.

NASA science mission chief Nicky Fox said losing Swift would eliminate a telescope and its capabilities at a time when the agency lacks funding to build a replacement. Katalyst is already developing a next-generation spacecraft that could attempt a similar rescue of the Hubble Space Telescope within two years.