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Operations CXO Status Report

Friday 30 July 2004 10.00am EDT

During the last week the observing schedule was interrupted on July 25, 27 and 28 due to high radiation events. The events stopped the daily load and activated the science instrument safing sequence (SCS 107). All actions were nominal and radiation levels dropped sufficiently to allow the loads to be restarted at 4.30 pm on Jul 29. Observations of RCS2156.7-0448, MS30.7, the moon, RXJ1420+5334 and SBS 1520+530 (total 106.8 Ks) were impacted by the event and will be rescheduled in a later load.

Real-time contingency procedures were required following the high radiation events on July 25 and 28 since Chandra was approaching an eclipse and the loads were halted. Real-time procedures were run on July 25 to place the spacecraft in normal sun mode and execute the proper commanding for eclipse passage. A procedure to recover to normal pointing mode was completed nominally on July 26. Real time commanding was completed on July 28 to execute the required eclipse commanding and a command load executed to place the spacecraft in normal maneuver mode to transit an earth occultation following the eclipse.

Chandra passed through the 4th and 5th eclipses of the 2004 summer season with nominal power and thermal performance. The final eclipse of the season will occur on July 31.

An image release was made on July 28 that presents the first detection of X-rays from stars in the Quintuplet Cluster, an extremely dense young star cluster near the Galactic Center. For details see: http://chandra.harvard.edu/photo/2004/quint/

The schedule of targets for the next week is shown below and includes an observation of 4U 1957+11 coordinated with RXTE.

------------------------------------------
4U 1957+11             ACIS-S/HETG  Aug 2
Vega                   HRC-I
Radiation Belts                     Aug 3
RCW103                 ACIS-I
RX J0720.4-3125        ACIS-S
Crab Nebula            ACIS-S/HETG
3C454.3                ACIS-S       Aug 4
Sculptor Dwarf Sph.    ACIS-S
CL0521-2530            ACIS-I
NGC4697                ACIS-S
RX J0720.4-3125        ACIS-S       Aug 5
NGC 4216               ACIS-S
M87                    ACIS-S
F1320-226              ACIS-S
Vega (3 obs)           HRC-S
LBQS 0051-0019         ACIS-S
Radiation Belts
HR 7329 B              ACIS-S       Aug 6
4U 1916-05             ACIS-S/HETG
cl1226+33              ACIS-I       Aug 7
NGC3132                ACIS-S
Radiation Belts                     Aug 8
RX J0720.4-3125        ACIS-S       Aug 9

------------------------------------------

All spacecraft subsystems continued to support nominal operations.

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