Happy Birthday WFPC2!

December 2003 marks the 10 year anniversary of the
Wide Field Planetary Camera 2.

A myriad of Heritage WFPC2 images with the classic "chevron" shape.

When Hubble was first launched in April 1990, astronomers and engineers soon learned that a tiny error in the curvature of the primary mirror led to out of focus images. In December 1993, a repair mission to Hubble allowed astronauts to replace Hubble's first Wide Field/Planetary Camera (WF/PC) with a new instrument, Wide Field Planetary Camera 2 (WFPC2), that would correct the light path and create in-focus images. WFPC2's famous shape has given a unique, signature style to resultant astronomical images from this detector.

The Hubble Heritage team extends noble thanks to all those that have worked to make Hubble a successful telescope, especially the WFPC2 Instrument Definition Team. As well, we wish to thank the many astronomers who have used WFPC2 over the past 10 years and whose astronomical data populates the Hubble archive, and thus, the Heritage collection.

Learn more about the classic chevron shape of WFPC2.