Jun 25 1999
From The Space Library
NASA announced that the WIRE Mishap Investigation Board had concluded that NASA's Wide-Field Infrared Explorer (WIRE) satellite had failed after its 4 March 1999 launch, "because of an incorrectly designed electronics box." The premature firing of explosive devices-the pyrotechnics-had caused the instrument's telescope cover to eject too early in the mission, thus exposing the instrument's frozen hydrogen to the Sun. The frozen hydrogen was necessary to cool the telescope's infrared detectors. The satellite had lost the frozen hydrogen within 48 hours of its launch, rendering the instrument incapable of carrying out its scientific mission. Darrell R. Branscome, Deputy Associate Administrator (Enterprise Development) for NASA's Office of Space Flight and chairperson of the eight-member investigation team, emphasized that there had been no component failure, but "simply a case of a design error that allowed power to get to the explosive charges before it should have." The board's report also concluded that engineers had failed to identify the design errors in the circuitry controlling the pyrotechnical functions. Unlike the other systems in the satellite, the electronics box design had received no peer review.
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