Hi fellow space-people! 🚀 Tuesdays are busy days for #MarsExpress (MEX), and so I'd like to take you through what I'm working on today as a Young Graduate Trainee for MEX. Later, I'll do a thread on the YGT scheme at ESA & other @esa opportunities! 🛰️ (Image credit: ESA)
As I discussed yesterday, as part of my work I get to plan observations for VMC @esamarswebcam, & that's what I'm doing today! My setup currently looks like this (the different colours on the 💻 represent different instruments, events etc, & the colours on Mars = elevation) 🔴
(When I first started, I remember my supervisor zipping through these screens with all the colours and me thinking, I'm never going to be able to understand all this 🤪 but after a few planning cycles, it all starts to make sense!) 🖥️
Today I'm adding 'additional limbs'. We plan MEX observations in 'Medium Term Plans' which start ~3 months before execution. VMC apocentre observations get added then, & limb observations are squeezed in at the end once the other instruments are fixed ⌛️
At 2pm, we have our weekly telecon with the MOC (Mission Operations Centre) at ESOC 🇩🇪 (thats @esa's European Space Operations Centre, where all the missions are actually 'flown' from 🛰️). It's v cool our colleagues are now flying a spacecraft from home! esa.int/Enabling_Suppo…
Later this afternoon at 4.30 we normally have our telecon with the instrument teams & project scientist to discuss the ongoing planning of science observations. At planning cycle Kick-Off meetings, we also get reports from the teams on how their observations are being used 🔬📶
When I finish the observation planning later today, I'll go back to processing data for @esamarswebcam 📷 and making the final changes to the products (including documentation) that we're going to archive on the Planetary Science Archive:
So tldr; Tuesdays are busy days for #MarsExpress bc we have our weekly meetings with both the Mission Operations team & the instrument teams. Today, I'm working on adding some additional limb observations for #VMC @esamarswebcam and then I'll go back to data processing! 😀🔴📷🛰️
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