The Cassini spacecraft continues its over six-year journey to Saturn in excellent health this morning, according to Cassini deputy program manager Ronald Draper. Cassini is in attitude control cruise, following an uplink sequence last night to update engineering flight software. The star reference unit has been turned on and star data is now being used to update the spacecraft's orientation.
"Spacecraft health remains excellent, with no anomalies," said Cassini spacecraft development manager Chris Jones. At 9:00 a.m. PDT today, the spacecraft's velocity relative to Earth was a little under 4.2 kilometers per second. Velocity should decrease to about 4.1 kilometers per second by the end of the day. Telemetry recorded on Cassini's solid state recorder during launch will be played back this weekend.
The Cassini spacecraft was launched from Cape Canaveral, FL, at 1:43 a.m. PDT on Oct. 15
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