HETE-2 Timeline: Satellite Pointing and Roll Angle Data

NASA's HETE-2 satellite telemetry records the spacecraft's pointing direction and roll angle over time, as determined by its onboard aspect camera. The High Energy Transient Explorer mission, launched in 2000, was designed to observe gamma-ray bursts. This table was updated thrice weekly during the mission, with the last provided update in August 2006.

Use Cases

• Reconstruct satellite attitude and orientation based on recorded boresight and roll angle data.
• Correlate instrument observations with spacecraft pointing for gamma-ray burst analysis.
• Analyze mission timeline and operational periods based on the thrice-weekly update cadence.

Strengths

• Data originates from NASA HEASARC, an authoritative source for space science data.
• Update cadence during the active mission was thrice per week, suggesting regular data ingestion.
• Specific mission dates are provided: launched October 9, 2000 and declared operational February 6, 2001.

Limitations

• Column-level documentation is absent; field semantics must be inferred after download.
• Data updates ceased in August 2006; the dataset is historical and not actively maintained.
• Row count is unknown, which may limit suitability assessment.

Provenance

Source

National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA) HEASARC

Collection Method

Recorded by the aspect camera/optical sub-system aboard the HETE-2 spacecraft.

Time Range

Covers the operational period from launch (October 9, 2000) through at least August 2006.

Freshness

Last metadata update 2026-03-13; data content is historical (last update August 2006).

Geography

Space-based observations; no specific terrestrial geography.