James Webb Telescope Construction Moves Forward

Engineers at in Redondo Beach have reached another milestone in the construction of NASA's James Webb Space Telescope with the completion of the platform used to align the satellite's sunshield, the company announced last week.

"The sunshield has now moved to a very significant pre-flight level of development as we continue to meet the challenges of engineering this one-of-a-kind component," Scott Willoughby, vice president and Webb Telescope program manager for Northrop Grumman Aerospace Systems, said in a news release. "Together with the recent completion of the mirrors, we are making noteworthy progress through the telescope's integration and test phase."

The platform—which is about 33 feet by 70 feet and weighs about 2,000 pounds—will be shipped to Huntsville, AL, where ManTech International Corporation will install the sunshield's template layers, according to Northrop Grumman.

Northrop Grumman also recently finished polishing the telescope's mirrors.

The James Webb Space Telescope, the successor to the Hubble Space Telescope, will be the "most powerful space telescope ever built," according to the news release from Northrop Grumman. "Webb will observe the most distant objects in the universe, provide images of the very first galaxies ever formed and study planets around distant stars."

The telescope is a joint project with NASA, the European Space Agency and the Canadian Space Agency.