Webb telescope heads for a special spot a million miles from Earth

Q: The $10 billion James Webb Space Telescope launched Christmas Day toward the Earth’s Lagrange Point 2, a spot about a million miles away where it will orbit the Sun at about the same speed as our planet. Where is Earth on this rendering of the solar system?

Circle the area on this map


Q: The Webb telescope was designed to see ...

A. Infrared light

B. Exoplanets

C. Distant past

D. All of the above

Q: A Lagrange Point is a place where the gravity of the Sun and a planet balance enough for smaller objects, like satellites or asteroids, to circle our star in relatively stable orbits. Each planet has how many of these spots?

A. Two

B. Three

C. Four

D. Five

Q: To see in the infrared spectrum, the Webb telescope must be kept under 50 kelvins. What is that on the Fahrenheit scale?

A. 370 degrees

B. 37 degrees

C. -37 degrees

D. -370 degrees

Q: If any of the Webb telescope’s hundreds of systems fails to work, astronauts won’t be able to fix it like they repaired the Hubble Space Telescope. Hubble is about how far away from Earth?

A. 33 miles

B. 333 miles

C. 3,333 miles

D. 33,333 miles


Answers for this quiz: Click here