The James Webb is Finally in Position

🛰️ NASA’s James Webb Space Telescope (JWST) performed its final course correction maneuver yesterday afternoon, putting itself into its final resting place roughly 1 million miles from Earth.

• Launched on Christmas Day, the $10 billion JWST was too large to fly to space in its final form. To remedy this, NASA launched the telescope folded up inside a rocket and designed a complex routine of shape-shifting and unfurling to be carried out upon reaching space. (This process was executed flawlessly.)
• The JWST is equipped with a 70-foot sun shield that'll permanently face towards the Earth and Sun. Its purpose is to keep the telescope’s instruments extra cold and allow detection of infrared signals from the furthest points in the universe.
• Once it reaches its intended orbit, JWST’s thrusters will still have to make minor adjustments every ~20 days to ensure it stays on track. Those two to three minute bursts will ultimately determine how long the telescope stays operational, as its mission ends when the fuel runs out in 10 to 20 years.

+Looking ahead: Scientists and engineers will soon start precisely aligning the telescope’s mirrors and testing all of its instruments. If all goes well, the first images are expected by this summer.