Premature ejection of the spacecraft aperture cover led to depletion of the solid hydrogen shortly after launch, ending the primary science mission.

In order to accomplish these goals, WIRE was to conduct a four-month survey at 12- and 25-μm over an area of between ten and several hundred square degrees of the sky.

Although ground controllers began work to decrease the excess spin of the spacecraft, they were not able to do so in time to prevent the total loss of the frozen hydrogen used to cool the primary science instrument.

In normal operations, the telescope would avoid pointing at the Earth as well as the Sun because the heat load was too high for the cryogenic cooling.

At this early stage in the mission, the telescope was deliberately pointed at the Earth for safety under the assumption that the dust cover was present.

However, due to the unexpected heating, the vent began expelling gas at rates orders of magnitude higher than designed.

[5] The WIRE asteroseismology mission was deactivated on 30 September 2000, reactivated through Bowie State University's Satellite Operations and Control Center from 2003 through 2006, then communications were finally lost on 23 October 2006.