For the James Webb Space Telescope, getting into space is just step one. The telescope must complete a complicated series of unfolding steps before it can observe the cosmos. The entire sequence, including getting the science instruments ready, will take about six months.
“A lot has to go right, that’s for sure,” says astronomer Scott Friedman of the Space Telescope Science Institute in Baltimore, who is in charge of this timeline. Webb will be heading to a point in space called L2, which is too far from Earth for astronauts to visit and make repairs. “There’s every reason to believe things will go very well,” Friedman says. “But we won’t know until we get there.”
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