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#276 2004-02-27 14:53:56

Rxke
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Re: Spirit & Opportunity *3* - ...continued from previous threads

I've been waiting for this since it landed! still have soyourners sunset as one of my all time favourite pics


'bout the eclipse: so that's why they keep shooting pics of the sun! They were simply rehearsing this... (kidding, those pics are for bearing, orientation, if i'm not mistaken)

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#277 2004-02-28 01:01:38

Stu
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Re: Spirit & Opportunity *3* - ...continued from previous threads

I'd personally be dead against using the rovers being sent to Mars, in this "Golden Age" of exploration, as cobbled-together comms relays or anything like that. Martians - native and incomer - of the future will surely feel the same desire to preserve and celebrate their past that we Terrans do, and they will want to have their own museums etc. We can't deprive them of that.

I can forsee - and, if I was a martian, would demand - a "Mars Heritage"-type organisation, dedicated to preserving both Mars' natural and artificial heritage, both the landscape and the artefacts sent from Earth in the past. Natural Parks will be established - a martian Yosemite in the heart of Marineris, the summit of Olympus Mons, the cratered, blasted Badlands of Argyre, perhaps - where martians and visitors alike will be able to go and relax and enjoy just being on Mars ("on Mars... on Mars..." sorry, caught an echo from the end of BLUE MARS there!) Of course, if terraforming happens (my views on which are well known) then that would eventually ruin that idea, but in the short term at least certain areas of Mars will be preserved as "Areas of Outstanding Natural Beauty", just as areas here in the UK are (at least until the Govt decides it wants to build another new town and just bulldozes them anyway...)

As for hardware, there'll surely be a martian Smithsonian one day, where martian kids will be able to go in the school groups, lead hand in hand by their teachers, and see Mars 4, the Vikings, Pathfinder and the MERs, as well as artefacts from the first manned landing site. That actual site will, I'd think, be preserved as it is, and visitors will be able to approach it but not go so close that they trample on the historic First Footprints. As for the rover / lander sites, maybe they'll feature recreations of the probes that landed there, and visitors will be able to walk around them, marvelling ("Wow! I didn't realise it was so small!") at the achievements of the JPL guys back in the Olde Days...

With all the furore over Hubble not being returned to Earth for honourable display in the Smithsonian, maybe now is the time to start thinking seriously about the future of our little mechanical ambassadors left sitting there on Mars after they've fulfilled their missions. They certainly deserve more credit, and respect, than being turned into Borgesque comms relays just to save a bit of money.

smile


Stuart Atkinson

Skywatching Blog: [url]http://journals.aol.com/stuartatk/Cumbrian-Sky[/url]

Astronomical poetry, including mars rover poems: [url]http://journals.aol.com/stuartatk/TheVerse[/url]

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#278 2004-02-28 04:07:31

Rxke
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Re: Spirit & Opportunity *3* - ...continued from previous threads

Stu, I understand your point of view, but consider this scenario: We have two MER, more stuff going up every 2 years, let's say we as humans won't get there before 2030, thats 15-20 pieces of hardware extra there (assuming Europe will launch landers too. Where do you draw the line? All or most of these things will land in the 'best' spots, for starters. Some will be 'generic' stuff, if ESA keeps doing the smart thing: recycle proved and tested platforms as they did in Mars Express...
Imagine 12 MER copies 'lying' around...
Sure the MERs of today are worth preserving, they're real breakthroughs, historically... But MER 5.2.a ? Dunno so sure anymore...  And just building into the (hypothetical) future rover an exra connector, so you can 'revive' it for for example comm duties, that's not going to hurt it too much, I'd think. No, it would be a 'hats off to the guys of JPL for making such versatile hardware.' Later on you can still put it up in Marsonian institute. No harm done.
About the first bootprints... Mars is not the Moon... Maybe the first one on Mars has to do a 'Bootprint' and then cover it with something to preserve it from the elements... later (much later probably) they can build a dome and show it again...

just to save a bit of money

No. To save a bit of much needed payload! If *reviving* say 2-3 landers (they weigh about 300kg each, right?) could save you enough payload for one extra crewmember (and i'm going to play it dirty, here: that crewmember is the backup geologist that otherwise wouldn't be in the mission) Then I say: go for it, people!

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#279 2004-02-28 05:41:49

GraemeSkinner
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Re: Spirit & Opportunity *3* - ...continued from previous threads

No. To save a bit of much needed payload! If *reviving* say 2-3 landers (they weigh about 300kg each, right?) could save you enough payload for one extra crewmember (and i'm going to play it dirty, here: that crewmember is the backup geologist that otherwise wouldn't be in the mission) Then I say: go for it, people!

Not only can it save payload space, if they did design in back up equipment on rovers that could be used again by manned missions it could prove lifesaving if the primary equipment carried with them failed. Would we wish to tell a crew that they could not touch any equipment that is on the surface as they may be required in the future for historical purposes - if that very same equipment meant the difference between completing a mission and getting back safely or becoming the first casualty of Mars? I'm all in favour of saving the first few rovers for historical exhibits, the technology on them would probably not be suitable to integrate with the items carried by a manned mission. But future rovers can be designed to have a useful function to a manned mission, we can not get too sentimental about everything we send up or we'll end up needing a Mars sized museum to display them all.
I have to agree with Rxke, use the future rovers again and take the geologist - I'd love to see their views of standing upon Mars.


There was a young lady named Bright.
Whose speed was far faster than light;
She set out one day
in a relative way
And returned on the previous night.
--Arthur Buller--

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#280 2004-02-28 05:48:46

Stu
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Re: Spirit & Opportunity *3* - ...continued from previous threads

Stu, I understand your point of view, but consider this scenario: We have two MER, more stuff going up every 2 years, let's say we as humans won't get there before 2030, thats 15-20 pieces of hardware extra there (assuming Europe will launch landers too. Where do you draw the line? All or most of these things will land in the 'best' spots, for starters. Some will be 'generic' stuff, if ESA keeps doing the smart thing: recycle proved and tested platforms as they did in Mars Express...
Imagine 12 MER copies 'lying' around...
Sure the MERs of today are worth preserving, they're real breakthroughs, historically... But MER 5.2.a ? Dunno so sure anymore...  And just building into the (hypothetical) future rover an exra connector, so you can 'revive' it for for example comm duties, that's not going to hurt it too much, I'd think. No, it would be a 'hats off to the guys of JPL for making such versatile hardware.' Later on you can still put it up in Marsonian institute. No harm done.

The problem is, there'll be no "later on". As soon as serious manned space exploration / exploitation begins, there will be a roaring trade in salvaging (i.e. stealing) spaceflight memorabilia from Mars, and before Mars the Moon, so unless the landers etc are gathered up and put in one place when there's no further need for them they will be vandalised and carcass-stripped long before they can be integrated into a useful planetary comms system.

Without treaties / agreements / law in place to prevent it, people will go scurrying around Chryse, Utopia, Ares, Gusev and Meridiani collecting every bit of hardware they can find for sale on the black market. Investors / collectors back on Earth with enough money and determination will find ways to ship Viking's robot arm, Sojourner's wheels and Spirit's camera mast back, for display in their own private collections, you can bet on that. How would you feel if you found out that the Columbia crew dedication plaque lovingly fixed to Spirit had been *stolen* and smuggled back home to Earth? Would that be worth the extra expense of building dedicated comms hardware?

Science fiction pessimism? Nope. This happens now, here on Earth. Artefacts from ancient countries, from the pyramids, temples and archaeological sites around the world are Tomb Raided and horded by individuals. More legitimately, we explore the Titanic and bring items back to the surface "for posterity" rather than leave them in place.

So while I agree that it may not be practical to save *everything*, we should certainly make the effort for hardware sent there, say, before the first sample return, that would be a logical cutoff point. What do you think?

I'm sorry, but I just can't agree that we should leave the Vikings, Sojourner and Spirit etc in place just to use them as glorified makeshift cellphone masts in years to come. There's a big - and justified - campaign now to save the Saturn V tower. No-one's keen on covering it in mobile phone dishes, or even melting it down to use in the new Crew Exploration Vehicle...


Stuart Atkinson

Skywatching Blog: [url]http://journals.aol.com/stuartatk/Cumbrian-Sky[/url]

Astronomical poetry, including mars rover poems: [url]http://journals.aol.com/stuartatk/TheVerse[/url]

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#281 2004-02-28 06:03:23

Stu
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Re: Spirit & Opportunity *3* - ...continued from previous threads

Not only can it save payload space, if they did design in back up equipment on rovers that could be used again by manned missions it could prove lifesaving if the primary equipment carried with them failed. Would we wish to tell a crew that they could not touch any equipment that is on the surface as they may be required in the future for historical purposes - if that very same equipment meant the difference between completing a mission and getting back safely or becoming the first casualty of Mars?

Well, that maybe worked for Val Kilmer in RED PLANET but in real life the chances of a stranded or incapacitated manned expedition crew being saved by one of Spirit's circuit boards are rather remote. And personally, if a manned expedition had to rely on that kind of thing as a "back up" plan then it would be too risky to send in the first place. The next logical extension of this argument is to have each lander and rover carrying a 10L bottle of Evian water "just in case future explorers need more supplies".

Also, the rovers are hardly going to be everywhere, are they? There won't be enough of them to provide emergency resource coverage for the entire planet. It's more than possible that the first manned expeditions will set down in areas unexplored by rovers because they'll want to see new geology and compare and contrast landforms/minerals with those studied by previous unmanned missions.

Of course in a life or death situation then all bets are off, people come before probes, and must, every time, and if a crewed expedition was in trouble in a location near a lander / rover, and that old hardware might give them a solution then fine, cannibalise away. But I think we're getting off the original argument a little.

No-one on this board wants to see people on Mars more than I do (well okay, everyone does, it's just a figure of speech!  :laugh: ) but let's not kid ourselves that fitting a few more bits and bobs on rovers-to-come, or superglueing aerials and/or hot-wiring in-situ landers will free up enough payload space or budget for an extra crewman on a mission.


Stuart Atkinson

Skywatching Blog: [url]http://journals.aol.com/stuartatk/Cumbrian-Sky[/url]

Astronomical poetry, including mars rover poems: [url]http://journals.aol.com/stuartatk/TheVerse[/url]

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#282 2004-02-28 06:13:28

SohoBoy
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Re: Spirit & Opportunity *3* - ...continued from previous threads

About the first bootprints... Mars is not the Moon... Maybe the first one on Mars has to do a 'Bootprint' and then cover it with something to preserve it from the elements...

I doubt that the lander sites will look much different a few hundred years. Erosional rates on Mars must be exceedingly slow. No rain, which contributes most to erosion on Earth, and the atmosphere is only 10Mb as opposed to 1000Mb on Earth. - only the very finest dust is lifted into the Martian atmosphere , compared to the sand which blasts rocks in the arid regions on Earth - all the Landers will need a few hundred years down the line  is a bit of dust off - very carefully! as I guess all exposed plastic/resin parts will be extremely brittle from UV flux by then.

[http://www.lyle.org/mars/imagery/2M1311 … 1.JPG.html]Crust and 'fuzz bunnies'

an excellent view of the salt/dust crust (?) produced by a Mossbauer print. A section of the crust appears to have fortuitously stuck to the Mossbauer, and been lifted out of shot

And we also see a couple very obvious examples of the 'fuzz bunnies' we've been seeing on the surface  - which look like small irregular balls of cotton wool/lint - in the Spirit and and Opportunity soil microphotos.

My favourite 'fuzz bunny' is the one in the [http://photojournal.jpl.nasa.gov/catalog/PIA05213]Mystery soil animation which folds in half (with it's right side dissapearing!), when the crust heaves up and then opens up underneath it.

The 'mystery spheres' look to me to be :

a) light & shiny
b) dark and shiny
c) light and fuzzy

according to location

are the fuzz bunnies a fine accumulation of salt crystals/filaments? Surprised nobody has mentioned these so far, or the fine black filaments seen in many of the soil photos which appear to give the soil its interesting 'structure' - tubes, plates, ribbons, troughs and 'starfish' forms - into which the ultra fine dust is bound together by the threads.

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#283 2004-02-28 07:23:32

Rxke
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Re: Spirit & Opportunity *3* - ...continued from previous threads

SoHoBoy...

The global dust storms seem capable of 'filling up' bootprinths, IMHO. Furthermore, evidence from soyourners dust accumulation measurements show it it non-trivial (the amount of settling dust) and that was outside 'storm-season'

Stu,...

Untill first sample return looks ok, if they don't keep delaying that infinetilelely (darn! Engrish!)
Furthermore i *do* think they'll land in vincinity of a rover, it would be crazy to land in a place where you don't have details about the surface conditions... Rover should offer a scouting mission that'll be sorely needed before people land, I'd think (See RobS book he's writing)

Anyway, Viking, Soyourner, Spirit won't be used as spare parts, they're not designed for that, and use obsolete technology (by the time humans land) so on that account they're safe. Looters notwithstanding...

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#284 2004-02-28 08:10:49

Stu
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Re: Spirit & Opportunity *3* - ...continued from previous threads

SoHoBoy...


Furthermore i *do* think they'll land in vincinity of a rover, it would be crazy to land in a place where you don't have details about the surface conditions... Rover should offer a scouting mission that'll be sorely needed before people land, I'd think (See RobS book he's writing)

Yeah, you're right, I've always thought that too, I have no idea why I said that!  roll

Okay, we agree on the pre-Sample Return Mission cut-off point for lander / rover preservation. That's progress  smile


Stuart Atkinson

Skywatching Blog: [url]http://journals.aol.com/stuartatk/Cumbrian-Sky[/url]

Astronomical poetry, including mars rover poems: [url]http://journals.aol.com/stuartatk/TheVerse[/url]

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#285 2004-02-28 08:45:18

Rxke
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Re: Spirit & Opportunity *3* - ...continued from previous threads

Then again, who are we?  big_smile (*self* depreciation! don't take this as an insult)

OTOH, i do think it can have its merits to think about these things, if only to come to some kind of logical consensus, and hoping NASA comes to the same one (heeheee, so we're basically looking at tea-leaves, trying to see the future)

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#286 2004-02-28 12:15:12

SohoBoy
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Re: Spirit & Opportunity *3* - ...continued from previous threads

The global dust storms seem capable of 'filling up' bootprinths, IMHO.

go with that... just making a point about erosion rates...the bootprint might fill up with dust, but its not going to dissapear in a hurry, as one on Earth would. My guess is that it would just sit there as a little anomalous dust filled trough for a very long time

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#287 2004-02-29 05:06:21

Stu
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Re: Spirit & Opportunity *3* - ...continued from previous threads

Er, guys... guys? Looks like Opportunity has been peeping over the crater rim... What's that bright ridge on the horizon over there..? ???

[http://www.lyle.org/mars/imagery/1P1312 … 1.JPG.html]http://www.lyle.org/mars/imagery/1P1312 … 1.JPG.html

[http://www.lyle.org/mars/imagery/1P1312 … 1.JPG.html]http://www.lyle.org/mars/imagery/1P1312 … 1.JPG.html


Stuart Atkinson

Skywatching Blog: [url]http://journals.aol.com/stuartatk/Cumbrian-Sky[/url]

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#288 2004-02-29 06:03:51

Rxke
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Re: Spirit & Opportunity *3* - ...continued from previous threads

Wowza... Must be East Crater, judging from the full-res landing pics. [http://www.jpl.nasa.gov/mer2004/rover-i … age-6.html]They're here...

Might be my imagination, but if you stare real hard on that landing pic, you see the faint dark spot that must be the depression in front of Opp. Orientation seems right...

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#289 2004-02-29 06:10:54

Rxke
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Re: Spirit & Opportunity *3* - ...continued from previous threads

Wowza again... That's *a lot* of white stuff on the rim... Same stuff as in the 'home crater? Same stuff they unearthed while doing the dig?

Hope the terrain towards East Crater is not a 'dust-sea' or something, looks eerily smooth...
Steve said he definitely wanted to go to East Crater, wonder how rough it'll be to actually negociate the rim itsel, if at all possible. Imagine looking down in that thing...

Spirit, meanwhile:  compare some pictures from the initial landing point to where it is now, terrain is gettin a whole lot rougher quickl, more and bigger sized rocks. He must've landed in the smoothest spot around...

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#290 2004-02-29 06:34:18

Stu
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Re: Spirit & Opportunity *3* - ...continued from previous threads

Wowza again... That's *a lot* of white stuff on the rim... Same stuff as in the 'home crater? Same stuff they unearthed while doing the dig?

Spirit, meanwhile:  compare some pictures from the initial landing point to where it is now, terrain is gettin a whole lot rougher quickl, more and bigger sized rocks. He must've landed in the smoothest spot around...

Yeah, just what I was thinking about the crater...just think if that edge is *all* bedrock? Would that mean Opp landed in a truly ancient area? Will East Crater be full of beads and berries? How many gateau-like layers will Opp stare down upon in East Crater's walls when it climbs the slopes and looks over the side..? Can't wait!!!

As for the terrain Spirit is driving into, yes, for days now I've been struck by how "difficult" it looks, especially when you browse the 3D pics of the area. Some big rocks, and so many smaller rocks so close together, the drivers are going to have their work cut out for them, that's for sure.

Wow, what were the odds of Spirit landing in such a flat area, and of Opportunity pulling-off a cosmic "Hole In One" with its own crater landing?  smile  smile


Stuart Atkinson

Skywatching Blog: [url]http://journals.aol.com/stuartatk/Cumbrian-Sky[/url]

Astronomical poetry, including mars rover poems: [url]http://journals.aol.com/stuartatk/TheVerse[/url]

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#291 2004-02-29 11:48:22

Stu
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Re: Spirit & Opportunity *3* - ...continued from previous threads

Wowza... Must be East Crater, judging from the full-res landing pics. [http://www.jpl.nasa.gov/mer2004/rover-i … age-6.html]They're here...

Right again Rxke  smile

[http://www.marsunearthed.com/Opportunit … Region.htm]http://www.marsunearthed.com/Opportu....ion.htm


Stuart Atkinson

Skywatching Blog: [url]http://journals.aol.com/stuartatk/Cumbrian-Sky[/url]

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#292 2004-02-29 12:40:04

Rxke
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Re: Spirit & Opportunity *3* - ...continued from previous threads

Phew... 7-800 meter drive... (Rough guesstimate)
At least it looks like, again, as luck may have it, Opportunity is facing a part of the rim that's significantly less steep than the rest... Judging from the overhead pics, almost diametrically opposed to that spot (also) there is a spread-out ejecta field, kinda fan-shaped... would be much harder to traverse...
All those strokes of incredible luck...

Imagine, if those MERS could be play the lottery, they'd be rich!   :laugh:

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#293 2004-02-29 15:35:29

Rxke
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Re: Spirit & Opportunity *3* - ...continued from previous threads

From Feb., 26: "....A patch of ground about half the area of a coffee table, imaged with the range of filters available on Opportunity's panoramic camera, has soil particles with a wide assortment of hues -- "more spectral color diversity than we've seen in almost any other data set on Mars," Bell said. ...."

Anybody been able to find a composite or similar of that feature? Sounds interesting...

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#294 2004-02-29 23:12:52

rgcarnes
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Re: Spirit & Opportunity *3* - ...continued from previous threads

Stu,

The white on the horizon at the edge of East Crater could be more white bed rock, or...larger crater, deeper penetration, water vapor within crater, condensation at crater edge, frost.

Its interesting to contemplate and seems possible in light of Odyssey's "water within a half meter of surface" findings.


Rex G. Carnes

If the Meek Inherit the Earth, Where Do All the Bold Go?

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#295 2004-03-01 02:38:20

remcook
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Re: Spirit & Opportunity *3* - ...continued from previous threads

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#296 2004-03-01 02:57:57

SohoBoy
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Re: Spirit & Opportunity *3* - ...continued from previous threads

Wowza again... That's *a lot* of white stuff on the rim... Same stuff as in the 'home crater? Same stuff they unearthed while doing the dig?

[http://www.keithlaney.com/OCI/R8.jpg]http://www.keithlaney.com/OCI/R8.jpg

A nice nice colour composite of the large ridge on the horizon from Keith Laney

[http://www.keithlaney.com/opportunity_color_images.htm]Keiths colour composites of the trench dug by Opportunity are also  worth having a look at. Click thumbnails at bottom of page for hires versions

Remcook:

..and what is this then? wink

[http://marsrovers.jpl.nasa.gov/gallery....M1.HTML

]http://marsrovers.jpl.nasa.gov/gallery....M1.HTML

the retrorocket back section and parachute of the lander. It was in the news a while ago when it was first spotted. There are also a couple of small very bright patches on the ground in the same general direction, which I'm guessing are bits of the airbags outer 'sacrificial' layer. or {more likely as the ground is flat and rock free) other bits of the entire lander assembly which detached en route to the ground.

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#297 2004-03-01 04:56:07

Stu
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Re: Spirit & Opportunity *3* - ...continued from previous threads

A nice nice colour composite of the large ridge on the horizon from Keith Laney

Oh wow... look at that detail and colouring! One of the coolest pics yet I reckon, thanks for the heads up!  smile


Stuart Atkinson

Skywatching Blog: [url]http://journals.aol.com/stuartatk/Cumbrian-Sky[/url]

Astronomical poetry, including mars rover poems: [url]http://journals.aol.com/stuartatk/TheVerse[/url]

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#298 2004-03-01 05:29:33

Stu
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Re: Spirit & Opportunity *3* - ...continued from previous threads

Don't want to sound all ALIAS here, but is anyone else out there getting the twitchy-itchy feeling that the JPL guys are being so quiet because they're building up to a Big Announcement of some kind?

I don 't know, maybe it's me, but it just feels very trickle-down, drip-feedy science at the moment. The "news" and comments all seems to be about page 3 or 4 little things like the sizes of pebbles, how cool it is the rovers have spotted discarded pieces of themselves, how gorgeous the martian sunset is... Day after day we see page after page of pictures of that BL**DY sundial   :rant: and the tiny sun, and no-one seems to be commenting on the fascinating and intriguing details seen in the pictures of the trenches dug by the rovers' wheels... And suddenly, even tho we're now drooling over pics of features out in the World Beyond The Crater there seems to be no rush to get Opportunity out of its crater, even when you can almost hear the rover itself screaming LET ME OUT!!!!!

I've been surfing and scanning many websites (tip: cyanova.com's space pages ( [http://www.cyanova.com/news/space.html]http://www.cyanova.com/news/space.html ) are an excellent resource for one-stop headline browsing) and many commentators seem to think the same thing - that JPL and NASA are slowly building-up to some sort of announcement about the existence of water on Mars now, today, and the implications that has for the existence of life. Gil Levin - one of the team who worked on the Viking missions and still, today, insists the Vs' instruments detected life there - is very excited about the pictures of the trenches and of the so-called "Magic Carpet" material, which he, like me in fact, thinks is mud, surface material rich in perhaps a briny water-ice that flowed briefly when compacted by the airbags. he also thinks that the material exposed in the wheel-dug trenches could even be ice. That might be pushing it a bit far, even for a bio-optimist like myself, but the debate is going on out there, and I'm just wondering if the usually-effusive JPL teams are now being so hush-hush because just around the corner is a Big Thing...

I mean, listen Scully... both rovers are heading for craters, now or at least soon, and peering into the craters will allow us to look beneath the surface, where we've always been convinced water lurks, in whatever form. I don't know, I'm just sensing in my gut that the rovers' missions are shifting - or may even already have shifted, behind closed JPL doors - from the search for evidence of past water to a search for existing water...

Are Spirit and Opportunity about to become water-diviners, or ice prospectors? Could the rovers have a chance of finding something even more exotic than hematite, or even ice?

Thoughts anyone?


Stuart Atkinson

Skywatching Blog: [url]http://journals.aol.com/stuartatk/Cumbrian-Sky[/url]

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#299 2004-03-01 05:53:05

Byron
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From: Florida, USA
Registered: 2002-05-16
Posts: 844

Re: Spirit & Opportunity *3* - ...continued from previous threads

Are Spirit and Opportunity about to become water-diviners, or ice prospectors? Could the rovers have a chance of finding something even more exotic than hematite, or even ice?

Let's hope so!  I mean, there is *plenty* of evidence of ice on Mars already...the real question is how much, and whether it could exist so close to the surface, especially in the form of a slushy brine.  If this possibility does turn out to be a reality, you can bet the folks at JPL will keep the wraps on it until they're pretty darned sure of their discoveries...

And yeah, let's get Opportunity out of that crater soon...lol... big_smile

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#300 2004-03-01 06:16:57

Rxke
Member
From: Belgium
Registered: 2003-11-03
Posts: 3,669

Re: Spirit & Opportunity *3* - ...continued from previous threads

First of all: a big humbs-up for the guy that made the colour-composites out of the raw data! Awesome job, chief!
(Though note the one with the trench and sperules is in false-colour, if i'm not mistaken... NASA/JPL favours the IR filters above the red one, so they get more info out of the pictures. Fair enough, I'd say but be careful interpreting them...
The fact the sperules look distinctly different in hue with the freshly unearthed white stuff is significant, but to what? Some kind of oxidation, weathering process or different material altogether?

The picture of the Opp.-trench doesn't look too 'wet,' IMO... At first glimpse you'd say: "it is bone dry, what are they talking about?"
But... there's still significant clumping, it is certainly *not* loose, hyper-dry dust... Something is keeping the bigger chunks together, and it's not electrostatic, they're too big for that (just playing the specialist, here, wink)
Could be 'glued' together with dried salts, but that, again, means recent precence of water...

Questions, questions... And were is the science data from the Mossbauer and APXS behind these pictures?

Hmmm... In another thread, started by Mr_Toad (from whom i really wish to hear more in the near future, he's a professional geologist,) I threw the stone in the duckpond: remember Moss & APXS are European built?
ESA has this (not-defendable, in my opinion) policy *NOT* to freely dissemnate their raw data to the broad public!
It goes to the institutes involved in the mission, they get the first, exclusive look, so they can be first to publish results...

Not fair. I as an European, feel it is part of my money that got into these missions, so data gathered should be out in the open ASAP. And if that's not "possible" then give us at least *some* results, hattammit! We got *one* (1) set of data, from Spirit's first measurements. And they had the gall to post the graphs without a clear legenda, to boot. That's insulting.

BTW. Why is everybody so annoyed with the sundial? If you want to take scientifically meaningful pictures, you have to do some serious calibration. It's not like the MER's can put a Kodak colour-calibration card on the ground, step back, and take a snapshot... So this is the way to do it... *every single* picture i take for my documentation (of restoration jobs) contains such a card. Without it, they're useless. You have to have a standard to compare to what you're documenting.

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