Aerospace engineer Rob Chapman is picture with fifth grade teacher Jaclyn Gafford.
Fifth grade students at Cherrington Elementary School had a special visitor on Monday, April 16. Rob Chapman, an aerospace engineer for Northrop Grumman, stopped by to talk about their latest project, the James Webb Space Telescope. Chapman, along with engineers from all over the world, have been working on this project for more than 20 years.
The James Webb Space Telescope (sometime called JWST or Webb) will be a large infrared telescope with a 6.5 meter primary mirror. The telescope will be launched on an Ariane 5 rocket from French Guiana in 2020. Webb will be the premiere observatory of the next decade, serving thousands of astronomers worldwide. It will study every phase in the history of our universe, ranging from the first luminous glows after the Big Bang, to the formation of solar systems capable of supporting life on planets like Earth, to the evolution of our own Solar System.