Posted: Wed, Feb 21, 2001, 9:17 PM ET (0217 GMT)
The project manager of NASA's Stardust mission said there are no worries about a minor thruster problem with the spacecraft that was recently reported. Thomas Duxbury told SPACE.com that the thruster problem -- where attitude control thrusters fire more times than necessary to correct the spacecraft's orientation -- was not a problem or concern to the project. "There is no concern about navigating past the comet and back to Earth. There is no concern about running out of fuel," he said. This statement came after the project itself reported the thruster problem in a status report issued last week, an issue that was picked up by Spaceflight Now and CNN, among others. The spacecraft is otherwise working well as had recently detected a mote of interstellar dust, the seventh such detection by the spacecraft since its launch a little over two years ago.

Related Links:

•  SPACE.com article about Stardust
•  Stardust web site