Page "Ulysses (spacecraft)" Paragraph 19

The previously announced mission end date of July 1, 2008 came and went but mission operations continued albeit in a reduced capacity.

The availability of science data gathering was limited to only when Ulysses is in contact with a ground station due to the deteriorating S-band downlink margin no longer being able to support simultaneous real-time data and tape recorder playback.

When the spacecraft was out of contact with a ground station, the S-band transmitter was switched off and the power was diverted to keep the internal heaters to add to the warming of the hydrazine.

On June 30, 2009 ground controllers sent commands to switch to its low gain antennae which ceased communications with the spacecraft along with previous commands to schedule the shut down of its transmitter entirely.