On May 19, ESTCube-1 passed away. She worked hard for 2 years and 2 weeks but finally her solar panels failed. Nevertheless, this is a day for celebration of the successful mission with a large number of achievements: about 50 theses, 80 scientific publications and presentations, 5 start-ups etc. Students and research partners from Estonia, Latvia, Lithuania, Finland, Germany, Slovenia, India, UK, USA contributed to the mission.
According to the technical requirements, the satellite should have survived in the harsh space environment for at least two years. So she did. And while the deployment of the electric solar wind sail tether still remains unaccomplished, we hope our friends from Aalto-1 team will make it. While we are looking forward to ESTCube-2 mission, please enjoy the last four images taken by EC-1. This is our tribute to the birthplace of the CubeSat standard, California.
Source: ESTCube-1 Facebook page.