Equipment Problems Hinder Shuttle’s Ozone Research

The space shuttle Discovery’s five astronauts cranked up their science instruments after reaching orbit Thursday, but ground controllers quickly encountered trouble in getting vital data on the Earth’s ozone data.

Two ozone monitors--one American and one German--had trouble sending measurements to the ground. German researchers began receiving good data from their device after switching to another channel on the shuttle antenna but then had to contend with an instrument-pointing problem.

Data from the U.S. ozone monitor remained unavailable to controllers, and the instrument was in danger of losing information. It was supposed to have supplied most of the atmospheric research data during the eight-day flight.

Scientists tried to minimize the impact by focusing on the most important ozone targets--sunrises in the Northern Hemisphere. At the same time, ground controllers scrambled to resolve the problem.

The major purpose of Discovery’s mission is to study the increasing loss of ozone over the Northern Hemisphere. The ozone layer, located in the stratosphere nine miles to 31 miles high, shields against the sun’s dangerous ultraviolet rays and is threatened by air pollutants.