Columbia shuttle satellite develops trouble

WASHINGTON, Nov 22: A satellite released on Friday by the space shuttle Columbia to study the sun spun out of control after its navigational system failed, NASA said.The Columbia8217;s six-member crew released the Spartan satellite following a one-day delay, but the satellite8217;s automatic navigation system failed to point the craft toward the sun.

NASA officials then cancelled the research mission and said they were evaluating various options. A space walk scheduled for Monday could be used to recover Spartan.Spartan was to orbit to study the sun8217;s corona and help calibrate Soho8217;, a 1.2 billion solar satellite that has been sending back data about the sun.Indian-born astronaut Kalpana Chawla reached out with the shuttle8217;s robot arm to recover Spartan but was unable to get a secure hold, leaving the glistening gold-coloured satellite spinning in space. The astronauts had an hour to retrieve the satellite before its on board timer would start an automatic 45-hour research program.

Mission control was waiting for the satellite to rotate back into a position where the shuttle8217;s arm could reach out again to grab it.Following its release, Spartan had been scheduled to fly free of Columbia at a distance of 70-100 miles making observations of the Sun8217;s high-temperature outer atmosphere, the corona.The deployment of the Spartan satellite had been delayed two hours because of a problem with another solar observatory, with which it was to make joint observations.