The primary way that we detect problems on the spacecraft is we make it smart enough to detect them on its own
So the spacecraft has a system called fault protection
It's constantly looking for how the spacecraft hardware and software is operating
Is everything going per plan? Do we have anything that's not operating as expected?
So if, we're spinning and the spin rate gets out of control, a fault protection is looking at the spin rate and determining:
Okay this level of spin is okay and, and if it gets past this number I'm not happy. And so if it gets to a number that it's not happy it will take action.
It actually will take care of it itself. And then after it's reconfigured or whatever,
then it will send down information and let us know that that's what happened.
Or, if it can't solve a problem or the problem is too large it will put it in safe mode
and basically say okay, I'm just going to wait for the ground to help me because I'm confused
Nothing should cause further problems for the spacecraft, we shut down the instruments, we shut down other aspects of the spacecraft
and we make it kind of operate very simply at a very low data transfer level so that when the earth picks it up its very apparent to us
right away that it's had a problem and we can then start fixing it right away.
The spacecraft would continue to operate after it experiences a particular fault. One particular fault will not result in a total failure of the spacecraft.
Our little spacecraft these days are very complicated and, and they're very smart they know how to take care of themselves.