During the last week Chandra completed the observing schedule as planned.

A real-time procedure was completed on Jan 4 to reconfigure the battery reconditioning resistors for Battery 3 in order to adjust the battery charge current. This change was in response to the loss of one of the five full charge Solar Array strings connected to Battery 3, resulting in a 20% reduction in full charge current. This level of current is sufficient for normal operations.

A Chandra press release was issued on Jan 9 describing a deep observation of the Cygnus A galaxy. The image highlighted a jet of material emanating from the central black hole. The Chandra data indicate that the jet has bounced off a wall of intergalactic gas, and then punched a hole in a cloud of high energy particles. For details see: http://chandra.si.edu/press/19_releases/press_010919cyga.html

Another Chandra press release was issued on Jan 9 describing observations of a tidal disruption event in ASASSN14-li. Observers have monitored the infall of the debris from the event to determine the black hole spin which they find to be about 1 rotation per 2 minutes. The observations imply that the black hole's event horizon and space-time are spinning at greater than 0.5c. For details see: http://chandra.si.edu/press/19_releases/press_010919bhspin.html

The schedule of targets for the next week is shown below and includes an observation of GraL 0659+16, which was accepted as a Director's Discretionary Time Target of Opportunity on Nov 30.