Wondering About the Hubble Space Telescope.

Twenty-four years ago yesterday (1990), the Hubble Space Telescope was launched from the Space Shuttle Discovery.  Can you believe it has been that long ago?  Everyone was so excited and couldn't wait to see its first images.  Oops, something was wrong!!  It was taking blurry pictures.  Its main mirror was not ground correctly and it seemed to have been a huge waste of time, money, and effort.  It had been planned for a very long time.  In fact, way back in 1923, way before the "space age", space telescopes were proposed.

Hubble is the only telescope designed to be serviced in space by astronauts, and as it turned out, a good thing.  There were five missions sent to repair it.  I, for one, am sure glad it got fixed.  It gave us the first telescopic detailed views of distant space objects from above the earth's atmosphere.  That opened up a great new way for us to see things we only dreamed of seeing.  It didn't have the huge collection surface mirrors that ground base telescopes have but it didn't have to correct for looking through the thick and shifting atmosphere.  So, a day late "happy birthday" to the Hubble Space Telescope.  Now, you all have a great day today, you hear?