Spirit & Opportunity 2 - Continued from original thread

Josh Cryer · 2004-01-25 04:35:36

Hehe, Bill Nye just asked a question... cute.

(Sbout how Spirit's problems will affect Opportunity's deployment.)

Stu · 2004-01-25 04:38:34

Just managed to get online and see the pics... missed all the fun of landing #2 this morning, and have been out of the loop for a day or so, ironically because I'm busy organising a huge "MARS DAY" science exhibition/Outreach event next Saturday here in Cumbria. Good to be back - I missed you guys!!!... and great to hear that Spirit is looking healthier

But these first pictures...

Oh... My... God...

Have you ever seen such an amazing place? It looks bizarre, beautiful, enticing, beckoning... we are going to have SUCH fun exploring this place, all of us here, thru Opportunity's eyes.

And the look of almost rapture on Steve's face, how his heart must be flying right now, after fearing they'd lost Spirit. I am so happy for him!

So what do you all make of the images so far? I think they are in a shallow crater, the horizon looks very sharply-defined and close too. And I'm sorry, but they really are going to have to stop pussy-footing aropund and admit that that could be mud around the lander, especially when you can see the imprint of one of the airbag *seams* in it!!

Going to do some serious surfing now, catch up on things...

Rxke · 2004-01-25 04:39:36

is it my impression, or did these pictures come in *really fast*?

the barely touched down, and already all that data, amazing, just amazing.

Hope they get Spirit troubleshooted, because they are not going to run around with Opportunity, before they know what caused the problems

Conerence: we're going to slow down deployment, to give Spir team more time to find the problem...

'How dark?' Half the brightness to anything we've seen yet
'Timeframe?' tomorrow and today: tests, comm. checks, 3fd day: less aggressive deployments (high-gain, cable cuts)
...slowly.
Probably sol 4 start standup

all in al 1;5 to two weeks.

1130AM PC next live conference

Rxke · 2004-01-25 04:43:49

seen this one?
[http://www.spaceflightnow.com/mars/merb … mage4.html]AMAZING!

these are supposed to be airbag impacts? Wow....

Josh Cryer · 2004-01-25 04:48:12

Missed you too, Stu! I'm glad you're here! They'll most likely replay all the fun all day tomorrow, so all is not lost for you, hehe. It's just so much more exciting to experience it in "real time."

I keep reloading the various image release sites, hoping for that dang full res color pancam image, but it's not here yet. The JPL MER2004 link in my sig is updating sloooOOowly but surely. I expect the pancam to be available there before the Mars Rover site (just a hunch).

In any case, this is really great, and I agree with every word you said Stu, this really is a beautiful, foreign, bizarre, just... spectacular place to be.

Steve Squyres is just so excited. And man, Rob Manning, 3 for 3, I'm so proud of that guy. I remember when Pathfinder happened everyone thought he was nuts with the airbag design. They really did. It's so awesome for his design to be the most successful design ever to land on Mars.

This is a great time to be a Mars fan.

edit: you should see that in color Rxke!!! Dangit, where is that color pancam image! Don't they know that that's the one we wanna see?

Edited By Josh Cryer on 1075027736

Mark · 2004-01-25 04:49:26

Yes, very nice briefing. They suprised Steve(and all of us) with a color image, so soon given how it took longer before we got ones from Spirit. It's a very interesting site and I think there'll be lots of fun there with Opportunity, but I do agree they should take it slower and easy with Opportunity until they nail down exactly what happened with Spirit so the same error doesn't occur again.

Shaun Barrett · 2004-01-25 04:49:57

I'm speechless!
Thanks so much, Josh, for all you've done for us with the photographs etc. Very nice work!

Have they actually said anything about this being a lake bed or was that just an initial impression?

I guess all that dark stuff is largely haematite(?). ???

Shaun Barrett · 2004-01-25 04:54:05

And thanks, Rxke, for that B&W picture of the impact marks. Unless they come up with a more plausible explanation, it is starting to look like Mars may be a planetary mud pile!

Sure looks like soft mushy mud.

Josh Cryer · 2004-01-25 04:54:08

Shaun, nope, nothing about it being a lakebed, the scientists seem to believe that it is in fact a crater or a depression (like Stu suggested- right on the money Stu!). I personally think it has a lot of lake-bed-like characteristics, and I'd lay money on those rocks being sedimentary (though I'm not bettin' with clark! hehe)!

I think that it's probably that we're in a lakebed in a very old crater that has filled in. That's my gut feeling here.

The ground is nothing we've ever seen before. Where is that dang color pancam image?!? You'll understand once you see it.

edit: remember guys, small particles act very very different in a vaccume-like environment. Just look at the footprints on the moon. You'd think that they were made by impressing into soft wet clay. I don't think this is mud at all, though. But I do believe that this is layered sediments! This is why on the top it's darker and on the bottom it's lighter. The color pancam image (which I keep referring to, I know) really shows it off.

Edited By Josh Cryer on 1075028172

Shaun Barrett · 2004-01-25 04:58:57

If we are down in a small crater, it's even more exciting because after we've had a good poke around inside it, we get to go over the crater wall and get another brand new panorama of what's outside!

Oh joy!! :laugh:

Stu · 2004-01-25 05:04:37

I'm honsetly stunned by how quickly these images are appearing on the net...

Just take a moment to think about the wonder of this, how far we've come... I mean, we send a probe to Mars, with its own brain, watch it land virtually live, and now we're sitting here, in our homes, a community of friends scattered all around the world, watching pictures from the surface of ANOTHER PLANET without any real delay, any censorship, any interference of any kind. We're *there* guys, we're THERE, on Mars, we're **involved** with this, we're a PART of it, all of us here on this board. Steve S, Rob M, all those guys on that panel are sharing everything with us every day, unselfishly, genuinely and sincerely; every up, every down, every high and low, every success and problem and failure. They let us see them happy and smiling, and they let us see them tired, and deflated, and wracked with worry and despair and confusion...

And in a couple of weeks Opportunity is going to roll off its lander and explore a landscape which looks like something from a dream. Near that horizon I am sure I can see layers of shattered bedrock, blocks of impact-shattered material... the ground beneath Opportunity's "feet" looks like once-melted and now-set treacle, I defy *anyone* to tell me that they're now not considering the possibility that it might be a mud of some sort.

And if we are in a crater, what vistas will greet us when we drive up the sloping crater wall and look over the top... will we see a vast plain, scattered with jagged outcrops of hematite? More craters? We can't have any idea...

And doesn't it just make you shiver?

Hesitate to use the term "Golden Age" but withing a month there will be a New Mars for everyone.

Look at those pictures...!!!!

Josh Cryer · 2004-01-25 05:06:43

[http://www.jpl.nasa.gov/mer2004/rover-i … age-6.html]http://www.jpl.nasa.gov/mer2004....-6.html

Speachless!

Waiting for the high res.

edit: Stu, ain't it grand! Man! This is awesome.

Edited By Josh Cryer on 1075028839
Edited by Moderator 2022/02/26

Mark · 2004-01-25 05:11:40

I opened up a similiar photo of Gusev crater and damn, that soil is COMPLETELY different, well, it looks so, quite amazing. I can't wait for a full 360 degree PAN CAM.

Stu · 2004-01-25 05:17:57

Listen, this "Magic Carpet" material... they put it down to possibly being unique to the surface material at Gusev, but it's there at Medidiani too, so I think we need to consider the possibility that the Magic Carpet material is being *caused* by the landing process itself. How about this...

The lander hits the surface at a fair speed, right? And when the air bags hit the surface, hard, the gas inside them will heat up as it is compressed, right? Soooo... how about this for a process. The airbags must get hot on the outside as they compress, as heat from the internal gas reaches the outer skins... surely it's a possibility that there will be enough heat to cause some heating of the surface material beneath the bags, maybe enough to warm water trapped in the dirt and soil sufficiently enough to cause some muddification... and when the airbags deflate, the gas - warm gas, remember - has to go somewhere right? Surely that hot gas playing over the surface will warm the dirt, maybe enough to melt any ice particles trapped within it and cause the surface material to folow, or at least muddify, briefly? I mean, come on! What more do they need? Air bag seams pressed into it... rocks pressed into it, bow waves around the rocks... what are they looking for, a hippo wallowing around in it?! :;):

I was prepared to believe that the Gusev Magic Carpet was an anomoly, but I;m not now. We're seeing it here too. I'm putting my neck out and saying that we must be seeing some kind of mud, caused by heat/friction/something from the impact of the airbags.

Anyone?

Mark · 2004-01-25 05:20:49

I'm no pro with geology and science, but your explanation does make sense to me. Heck, Mars Express, from what I've read(unless I miss-read something), found alot of water ice in the Southern Polar region of Mars, the water ice is perhaps beneath the surface of the entire planet? I don't know.

Josh Cryer · 2004-01-25 05:26:34

Stu, I dunno, but I do know with reasonable certainty that we simply don't know what the processes are yet. Remember, when Spirit took some close ups of the soil, and attempted to press down on it, there was no change! None at all! What could cause this? No one knows, and unfortunately Spirit fritzed out on us before we could really get that question answered (though I personally think the science derived from these missions will take a very long time to figure out).

So I think you're right in saying something unusual, or something intriguing is going on here. Certainly Steve Squyres thinks so, or he wouldn't have been so fascinated with the soil. Indeed, I believe outside of the outcrops, the soil is the second most fascinating thing for him in this landing zone. He can't wait to dig down, as it were. Press the insturmants to the ground.

I'm excited about the black dots strewn all about. Wonder how long until people start speculating that it's some kind of living organism? What if it is?!? My goodness... can you imagine?

Steve Squyres wants to spend (jokinly he said) a "month" at the rock outcrop. I can't agree with him more. Wouldn't it be great to get the RAT to go at those rocks in a line (you know, one RAT attempt then another an inch lower, and another an inch lower, etc), so that we can get a closeup of the rocks? Especially if they're sedimentary; that would allow us to date them somewhat. I'm really excited about this new area.

Spirit showed us the first nearly rockless terrain. Opportunity showed us not only a rockless terrain, but one with a few outcrops to look at. I simply cannot express how amazing this all is.

edit: I have something special for you Stu: a high res color pan cam image!

click: [http://photojournal.jpl.nasa.gov/catalog/PIA05144]http://photojournal.jpl.nasa.gov/catalog/PIA05144
direct link (WARNING 20MB .tiff file!): [http://photojournal.jpl.nasa.gov/tiff/PIA05144.tif]http://photojournal.jpl.nasa.gov/tiff/PIA05144.tif

Edited By Josh Cryer on 1075030121

Stu · 2004-01-25 05:33:15

Stu, I dunno, but I do know with reasonable certainty that we simply don't know what the processes are yet. Remember, when Spirit took some close ups of the soil, and attempted to press down on it, there was no change! None at all! ]

Yeah, but remember that "pressing down" was being done by a teeny metallic finger, a very gentle prodding... I can't help thinking that a whopping-big gas-bloated hot airbag smashing into the ground at several km/h and then rolling across it, bleeding heat and gases, would have more effect

Gonna check out that image now, thanks for sending it...

Josh Cryer · 2004-01-25 05:41:08

The red channel seems to be a bit saturated in the image, I suspect that the final image will be a little browner, but this is just specualtion. The area may simply be so red that the final image shows more reds on the rover due to oversaturation. I fiddled with the hue a bit, got something more like the Spirit images, but it looks a bit "too" brown, so I guess I'll wait to see what the team comes up with. Certainly the redness on the rover is an exaggeration, though.

edit: the thing about these images is that, from the standpoint of soil, compression creates a lot of artifacts; I suspect that this first pancam image is actually greatly compressed (the colors in this image, and the detail isn't that great, though it's still better than the navcam images).

Black and white pancam images seem to be giving us the best soul results.

Check out this image to see what I mean (perhaps compare it to the color pancam image): [http://photojournal.jpl.nasa.gov/catalog/PIA05143]http://photojournal.jpl.nasa.gov/catalog/PIA05143

Edited By Josh Cryer on 1075031256

Stu · 2004-01-25 05:41:43

Aaagh, .tiff again... I have no luck with those. Guess I'll have to wait for a fat juicy jpeg to appear

Michael Bloxham · 2004-01-25 05:44:08

Y'know, in some sense I'm hoping these images will raise many more questions than answers. We're sure to get the attention of the media with this one... HotDangFred! Don't you just want to be there right now, sift your fingers through the soil...

Mark · 2004-01-25 05:46:11

It'll be interesting once the rover makes it's way up and past that horizon, it seems as though it's on a slope at the moment.

Josh Cryer · 2004-01-25 05:52:31

Stu, I really recommend getting XnView... it'll let you view practically any image file, and it's free. You can get it here: [http://www.xnview.com/]http://www.xnview.com/

XnView is really great for panning these huge .tif files. You can pan about with ease, zoom in, do zone edits so if you want to change the hue on a certain area, you just select it, etc.

In any case, the high res .jpg should be available here in awhile: [http://photojournal.jpl.nasa.gov/jpeg/PIA05144.jpg]http://photojournal.jpl.nasa.gov/jpeg/PIA05144.jpg

Stu · 2004-01-25 06:04:34

Stu, I really recommend getting XnView... it'll let you view practically any image file, and it's free. You can get it here: [http://www.xnview.com/]http://www.xnview.com/
XnView is really great for panning these huge .tif files. You can pan about with ease, zoom in, do zone edits so if you want to change the hue on a certain area, you just select it, etc.
In any case, the high res .jpg should be available here in awhile: [http://photojournal.jpl.nasa.gov/jpeg/PIA05144.jpg]http://photojournal.jpl.nasa.gov/jpeg/PIA05144.jpg

Good advice, as usual, thanks! I'm actually writing this on my laptop, away from home, so I'll wait until I get back to base to do that.

Looking forward to seeing the jpeg tho... that rock "wall" over there near the horizon is fascinating isn't it? Can't decide if it looks more like sedimentary layers or shattered bedrock, like a breccia layer or something. I do think it's stronmg evidence for Opp being in a crater tho, we've lots of pics of lunar craters which show similar "terracing". Wow... sudden thought... sedimentary bedrock... micro-fossils...

Wouldn't that be a thing?

Josh Cryer · 2004-01-25 06:17:35

If it's sedimentary, I'm going to go to the Mars Society 2004 convention. Sort of a self bet here. I'm betting on it being sedimentary, and that's my reward if I'm right.

The pancam image of that 'wall' (Steve calls it an outcrop) is going to be quite possibly the most fascinating image we've ever seen from Mars. We've never ever seen layered rocks on Mars, and these look like layer rocks! I really hope we're not wrong about this one.

I've seen rocks like this in Colorado. They had lots of fossils in them. I'm not sure how, but I think part of Colorado was underwater or something. Or at least, the fossils were in a muddy region (that's the only way to get fossils, duh!). I recall meeting a geologist on one of my rock climbs, and he was digging away at what was a 'dirt' path I'd walked many times. I was very surprised to find that just feet under this dirt path was soft rock with fern fossils in it! It blew me away that all those years I'd walked this path that there were fossils beneath my very feet. I still have several dozen "geode" from my various climbs. They're created via muddy pebbles rolling down some hill, grabbing up bits of rocks here and there, and finally stopping, to be fossilized, on the surface (crazily enough!) over many thousands of years.

Shaun Barrett · 2004-01-25 06:44:35

Just getting back to the 'is it really mud?' discussion, I came across a website commenting on the Mars Express discovery of the water-ice signal at the South Pole.
Although Dr. Nick Hoffman (Australian scientist) is still clinging to his "White Mars" scenario, with all the martian channels etc. caused by flows of liquid/gaseous CO2 mixed with rubble and dust, it seems the new data are being accepted as proof that Mars is, or at least was, a watery world.

Another Aussie scientist holds the opposite view to that of Dr. Hoffman:-

Monash University's Andrew Prentice, who is involved with NASA's upcoming mission to Saturn, was thrilled by the latest finding, after having theorised that Mars was the most water-rich of all the solar system's planets.
Dr. Prentice's calculations suggested Mars had as much water as Earth, despite being one-tenth its size. The origins of both planets, about 4.5 billion years ago, supported this, he said.
"Mars formed at a cooler temperature than the Earth. So if Earth was successful at capturing water then Mars would have been even more successful."

For the whole article, check out [http://www.theage.com.au/articles/2004/ … 56967.html]THIS SITE.

Who knows? Maybe there's much more water on Mars than even Odyssey and Mars Express have hinted at.
What does that do to the odds of that smeary stuff being real mud?
???

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Re: Spirit & Opportunity 2 - Continued from original thread

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