After decades of development and many trials and frustrations along the way, the James Webb telescope has finally started to deliver what it came for. On July 12, Nasa released the first scientific observations made by the suite of instruments carried on board the mission, marking what we eagerly anticipate will be the beginning of a new era in astronomy.
After the nail-biting launch on Christmas Day, a series of critical deployments followed to open up the telescope and its sun-shade. If any of these operations had failed, James Webb would have been an unusable disaster. But the programme was perfectly executed, a process that ran more smoothly and successfully than any one of us had dared hope, let alone expect.
