NASA shuttle uses onboard cameras to ensure safety

JANUARY 15--Space Shuttle Discovery Mission STS-116 was the third shuttle mission to use Adimec (Stoneham, MA, USA; www.adimec.com) advanced camera technology as part of an imaging system to ensure shuttle safety. Adimec provided the high-resolution cameras that were part of the orbital boom sensor system (OBSS).

Multiple high-performance cameras were coupled to a Pleora (www.pleora.com) iPort IP engine. This enables high-resolution images to be streamed to a laptop inside the shuttle over a standard Ethernet link. The imaging system is mounted at the end of the shuttle's 50-ft robotic arm and is controlled by the crew.

NASA's OBSS system on this robotic arm is used to inspect and measure defects in the shuttle's outer 'skin', particularly in the heat tile area, the reinforced carbon-carbon wing, and the nose cap. NASA needed high-performance cameras with enough durability and performance to provide flawless images in the void of space and on the space shuttle.

The Space Shuttle Discovery and its crew landed on December 22, 2006, after a 12-day, 5.3 million-mile journey in space. The mission succeeded in reconfiguring the International Space Station's power and cooling systems from a temporary setup to a permanent mode and adding a new piece to the station's backbone.