TESS Observations

TESS launched April 18, 2018 at 6:51 p.m. EDT from Cape Canaveral Air Force Station in Florida atop a SpaceX Falcon 9 rocket. Regular science operations with TESS began on July 25, 2018. Since that time, TESS has tiled the sky with ~27.4 day-long (2 spacecraft orbit) observing sectors.

The prime mission tiled the southern ecliptic hemisphere for the first year, then moved to the northern ecliptic hemisphere. During the extended missions, TESS continues to alternate between the southern and northern skies while also filling in the ecliptic plane. For more information on the observing strategy, click here.

Sector Observation Dates

The start and end dates for each sector are listed below. The MAST provides an up to date summary of TESS data available at the archive. Information on how to access the data can be found here. Note that the data for each new sector is typically available within 1 month of the end date for a given sector. Users are encouraged to check the MAST status page to check on the data availability for particular sectors.

The spacecraft and individual camera pointing positions are available from MIT.