The Hubble Space Telescope is an instrument used by astronauts to observe the universe and what it contains. Ever since it was launched into low Earth orbit in 1990, the telescope has been one of the most important tools to astronauts because of its immense size and versatility. However, over the weekend something happened to the telescope that could potentially set it back for some time or even shorten its overall lifetime.

The telescope was forced to be placed in “safe mode” because it lost one of the gyroscopes that it needs to point the spacecraft. While the telescope has five other gyroscopes it can use, the mechanism that allows it to switch gyroscopes was malfunctioning. This leaves the telescope with only two gyroscopes that astronauts can use, but the telescope needs at least three in order to function at optimal efficiency. Right now, scientists and engineers are working to fix the malfunctions and bring the gyroscopes back online. Depending on how long this takes and the actual fix, astronauts could be limited in when they can observe the universe again and/or how they can observe it (in what direction, to what distance). Additionally, the next space telescope that will be released into space will not exit the atmosphere until 2021; so if scientists come to find that the Hubble Space Telescope will “die” years before that date, then the scientific/astronomic community and institutions could be set back on research and innovations for an extended period of time. Nevertheless, this occurrence could serve as a learning experience for engineers in the future to focus on designing telescopes without gyroscopes and, in turn, with fewer flaws.