NASA’s Kepler Spacecraft in Jeopardy After Malfunction, Astronomers Say

NASA’s Kepler Spacecraft in Jeopardy After Malfunction, Astronomers Say NASA’s planet-hunting Kepler spacecraft has been crippled by the failure of one of the reaction wheels that keep it pointed, the space agency is announcing this afternoon, according to astronomers close to the situation. If engineers cannot restore the wheel or find some other way to keep the spacecraft’s telescope pointed, it could spell a premature end to one of the most romantic and successful of NASA’s missions: the search for Earth-like planets in habitable orbits around other stars. Just last month, astronomers reported that Kepler had found two planets only slightly larger than Earth orbiting in the “Goldilocks” zone, where liquid water is possible, of a star 1,200 light-years from here. More planet candidates, even smaller and closer to being Earth-like, lurk in the pipeline, astronomers say, but they have not yet been confirmed.