The Webb Space Telescope Reaches Its New Home on This Week

 

- 

 The Webb Space Telescope Reaches Its New Home on This Week, January 24 @NASA 

-

 
NASA’s James Webb Space Telescope soared from French Guiana on South America’s northeastern coast, riding a European Ariane rocket into the morning sky on Saturday. The $9bn observatory hurtled towards its destination 1.6 million kilometres (1 million miles) away – or more than four times beyond the moon. 

It will take a month to get there and another five months before its infrared eyes are ready to start scanning the cosmos. First, the telescope’s enormous mirror and sunshield need to unfurl; they were folded origami-style to fit into the rocket’s nose cone. 

Otherwise, the observatory will not be able to peer back in time 13.7 billion years as anticipated, within a mere 100 million years of the universe-forming Big Bang