But soon he became aware of another potential market. For early aviators, instrument flying often consisted of weighted strings or silk stockings tied to wing struts. Eighty years later, no one has come up with a better way to allow pilots to keep their aircraft on course and under control when they can't see out the window. Without Sperry's gyroscopes, we'd all still be using trains as our primary inter-city transportation. We also would never have made it very far in space.
Every spacecraft uses gyroscopes to remain stable and properly aligned.
Apparently, a high-energy particle penetrated the skin of the spacecraft. There are six gyroscopes on the telescope and as of about a month ago, only three were still spinning. So a billion-dollar telescope, which continues to marvel astronomers and the public alike, is one failure away from being scientifically useless. Hey, you gotta spend money to save it. At least that's what my wife keeps telling me.