Hubble floats above a blue Earth streaked with clouds.

A astronaut anchored to the robotic arm in front of Hubble holds up a camera device to take a picture. Another astronaut is visible working on Hubble behind him.

Hubble floats over a dark and cloudy Australia, oriented so the back of the telescope faces the viewer. A portion of the shuttle's robotic arm can be seen in the right corner, extending toward the telescope.

Hubble STOCC Open House

The Hubble Space Telescope Operations and Control Center (STOCC) is the heartbeat of Hubble operations. Inside this facility, behind Hubble’s captivating images and groundbreaking science, is a team of people who control the telescope, ensure its health and safety, and innovate ways to keep it at top performance. This open house provides you an opportunity to talk to this group of engineers, scientists, communicators, and operators and see the facilities and historic artifacts close-up.

Location

Goddard Space Flight Center
Greenbelt, MD

Hubble STOCC
Building 3

Date

July 18, 2024

Time

11:00 AM - 1:30 PM

Process

The Hubble STOCC Open House has eight stations; each one staffed with experts that support Hubble's mission including senior scientists, engineers, flight operations personnel, and communications professionals. Visit each station to get an overview of a given technical area and have your questions answered.

Please visit Station 1 first. Visits to subsequent stations may be completed in any order. If one station has a lot of people, move to another that doesn’t.

Map

Illustrated map layout with text, black outlines and colored numbers of the Hubble STOCC.

Hubble STOCC map.

NASA

Stations

Handouts & Instructions – Here you will find Hubble lithographs, bookmarks, career cards, & more.
Overview of the Spacecraft – A high-level summary of Hubble's optics, pointing & control system, instruments, & other hardware.
Interactive HST Science & Spacecraft – Learn more about the Hubble mission through augmented reality, holograms, an interactive Skymap, and our Table-Top Role Playing Game.
Hubble Science – Discover the science behind some of Hubble’s famous images where they are displayed in lightboxes.
Overview of the Mission Operations Room (Command Center) – Learn about Hubble flight operations.
Astronaut Tools – See some of the custom tools built for astronauts & learn how astronauts used them to make repairs.
Spacecraft Hardware – Examine a Hubble gyroscope pulled apart, see an instrument detector, & other pieces of Hubble hardware.
Overview of Operations Support Room & Subsystem Engineering (enter through the door on ramp side: you must sign in & out) – Talk with Hubble engineers about their duties, & see live data on Hubble’s subsystems.

Photograph of a group of engineers sitting in front of their computers inside of the "Space Telescope Operations Control Center." This image was taken during Hubble's Servicing Mission 4, which is on the screen in the front of the room.

Engineers, scientists, and operations personnel monitor Hubble from the Operations Support Room during Servicing Mission 4 in 2009, the final mission to repair and upgrade the Hubble Space Telescope.

NASA