1-154-872 - NASA/Oxford Science Archive/Heritage Images

Deployment of the Hubble Space Telescope, 1990. The Hubble Space Telescope (HST) was put into orbit from the Space Shuttle Discovery, mission STS-31 on 24 April 1990. HST, still in the grip of the shuttle's robot arm, is backdropped against Cuba and the Bahamas. HST was designed to see seven times further into space than had been possible before, without the distortion caused by the earth's atmosphere. Problems with its giant mirror meant that it did not initially work as well as expected. Corrective optics were installed in 1993, greatly improving the telescope's performance, enabling it to view the Universe in unprecedented detail.