Mars

[Suff]

Unbelievable stuff... I can't get enough Mars.... I'm excited about this trip. Life there or not... This time we'll find out one way or the other. If we do find life was there or is still there... what next? WHo, what and where....

Here's some links I chased down in pursuit of Pictures and Videos

No narrartives.. They're all good..


http://www.nasa.gov/externalflash/m2k4/frameset.html

http://photojournal.jpl.nasa.gov/gallery/snt

http://seds.lpl.arizona.edu/nineplanets/nineplanets/mars.html

http://www.nasa.gov/externalflash/m2k4/index1.html

http://marsoweb.nas.nasa.gov/landingsites/

http://www.fcw.com/fcw/articles/2004/0105/web-nasa-01-07-04.asp

This site claims NASA had a BILLION hits since the probe landed.

http://science.nasa.gov/headlines/y2004/05jan_spirit.htm

[Tom]

Great links...fascinating stuff.
When you think about it, it is really amazing that we're sitting here looking at live video of another planet!
One of these days, wer are going to see someone looking back at us!

[shanta]

THANX FOR THE LINKS! YOU ARE A MAN OF YOUR WORD! THEY ARE ALL GOOD! RICHIE

[freeneasy]

Originally posted by Tom
Great links...fascinating stuff.
When you think about it, it is really amazing that we're sitting here looking at live video of another planet!
One of these days, wer are going to see someone looking back at us!

yikes

[Suff]

I'm not sure what readers of this Forum see or hear Locally about the Mar's Probe. I know that Boston's academic and technology commuinity is sizable. So its a Top story and top topic of conversation here. And I'm eating it up... I'm all Mars 24-7 lately.

We could take out a 100 Saddam Hussiens and that would'nt come close to the Pride I feel that our country is the Trailblazer into space and space related technology..... When you think of the greats... The Rome's, The Athens, The Byzantyines, The Ottomans..and all the great civilizations... History records the explorers! What makes a Civilization great is the mark it leaves with the accomplisments of its People... When you think of Eygpt, do you think of the wars it won or what form of government it had? No... You think of the Pyramids its people built.

Rome was the first city in the world to reach a Population of ONE MILLION people. After its fall.. it was another 1000 years! 10 centuries! Before another city on the planet had one million people. Rome left a mark.

The USA is making its mark....We're the space explorers! JFK promised the country... and he said in his Lifetime we would land a man on the moon.. and that we would beat the Russians! Too bad he's gone. But his legacy lives. He pointed us to Space.



Here's an interesting story about the Probe that may or may not have gotten heard by to many...


Did you see how the Probe landed? It was surrounded by those Big BALLS that acted like a babys toy when hit MARS?

Btw.. the probe was going 12,000 MPH when it entered the Mars Atmosphere! So it slams into MARS surrounded by these HUGE balls.... Well I learned yesterday where they got that IDEA and how and why they perfected to get the PROBE in one piece when it slammed into the PLANET....


They had expiremented with the Ball landing theory previous.. But without being able to land the probe where they wanted too... it was determined the BALLS idea would'nt work. If it landed in a Rocky area with Cliffs and caverns.. the Balls would get Jammed in between walls and large Rocks....so it was tossed.. the ball Theory was downgraded.

Then one day they were expirmenting in the Mojave Desert with The Rover Portion of the Probe. They put these enormous Tires on it.. and one broke off..! And in a 20mph wind it screamed through the desert and Bounced off huge rocks... They actually had trouble Corraling the tire... They had a Big Convoy chasing it around the desert.

So they revisited the Ball Landing idea , but instead of 100's of "Beach Ball" size balls.. they used those ENOURMOUS balls that you see in the Pictures.

I thought this story was interesting... They turned an error into a discovery. Its great life advice. Keep expirementing and learn from my mistakes... works for nasa.



I chased down the KINGS of the Mars Message Boards.. Mars, mars and more mars



http://www.newmars.com/cgi-bin/ikonboard/ikonboard.cgi?

[BillW]

Suff,

It is amazing how a lot of discovery/inventions are by mistake or error. I'm looking at post-its on my monitor here, a failed attempt at a new super adhesive by MMM.

Bill

[Suff]

Originally posted by BillW
Suff,

It is amazing how a lot of discovery/inventions are by mistake or error. I'm looking at post-its on my monitor here, a failed attempt at a new super adhesive by MMM.

Bill

3M. Common Household name. How many know what the 3 M's are?

Minnesota Mining and Manufacturing.....

[BillW]

Originally posted by Suff
3M. Common Household name. How many know what the 3 M's are?

Minnesota Mining and Manufacturing.....

That's why they screw up when they try to make glue :p

[Suff]

Live Webcam... Live MARS....

http://www.nasa.gov/multimedia/nasatv/MM_NTV_Web.html

[Dick Schmidt]

Suff,

I live about 10 minutes from JPL and know several people who work there. Talk about little kids at Christmas, these guys are more excited than you can imagine. And starting next week they go on two shifts when the other lander sets down.

I spent a day up there in their visitor's gallery as a guest watching the first color pictures come in and checking out the mock ups of the rover they have set up, including the balloons. You always think of scientists as sober, reserved people, but when that picture started to come in, they were cheering, laughing, drinking champagne, kissing each other and just carrying on like a fifth grade class that just learned furnace exploded and school was canceled for two weeks. What fun!

A good friend of mine who worked there (he helped develop TPR among other things) once was asked by reporters why we should spend "all that money" on space when we have "so many problems" here on earth. His answer was: "That is what vigorous civilizations do." Looks like we did it again!

Dick

Who looks to the heavens and wonders.

[Suff]

Picture this... we make some way out whacky far out discovery. Like a Fuel source that does'nt have any emmissions... or something even wilder like a FOOD source or LIFE extending Element that we do not have on earth...

so we send up bunchs of Robots,,, and we program them to mine this discovery... and we send up all the parts and we Program them to BUILD more of themselves and Fix and Repair themselves as well.. and they send it back to us...

I mean who knows what could be Kicking around up there.

[Suff]

It took the probe 7 months to get there. Its light years away. Million Miles away right. so the fact is.. when you log on and look at Mars.. Your looking at a LIVE shot.. but your actually looking back in time... because Matter cannot transcend time... What we are looking at actually happened many many years ago.. maybe 1000's of years ago... we are actually not on what Mars Present day would look like were it get closer suddenly....

We are back in time... we are in a sense time traveling right now.

[Tom]

It is our destiny. It is what humans do-explore, discover, grow.
The benefits we get from the research and development that back up the space program are many. Tang, for example.
And, after watchin gthe landing this week with that big sack of balls to break the fall, gave me a great idea...I am going to get one of them and wear it when I go to the bar....should make life easier! :D

[ceejay]

One nice advantage of DishNet is Nasa TV. I've been trying to watch the daily Mars press conferences @ 11:00 AM CST. Way cool!!!

I understand that the two rovers (Spirit and her twin) cost $1.1 Billion. Well worth the cost IMO.

[superfecta]

What new technology will come from this mission?It boggles the mind if you think of what the first space missions gave us.

[PaceAdvantage]

Originally posted by Suff
It took the probe 7 months to get there. Its light years away. Million Miles away right. so the fact is.. when you log on and look at Mars.. Your looking at a LIVE shot.. but your actually looking back in time... because Matter cannot transcend time... What we are looking at actually happened many many years ago.. maybe 1000's of years ago... we are actually not on what Mars Present day would look like were it get closer suddenly....

We are back in time... we are in a sense time traveling right now.

Hold on there mister....I think you got things mixed up a bit....it only takes light 8.3 minutes to travel from the Sun to the Earth....Mars is a lot closer to us than the sun (about 50 million miles closer!!)....so it takes light that is reflected from Mars to Earth a lot less time to get here....Mars is certainly NOT light years away....it is only about 35-40 million miles from Earth to Mars

Light speed is 186,000 miles per second, so it takes light from Mars about 3.5 minutes to get to Earth....

So, when you look at Mars, you are seeing what happened 3.5 minutes ago...

[Suff]

Originally posted by PaceAdvantage
Hold on there mister....I think you got things mixed up a bit....it only takes light 7 seconds to travel from the Sun to the Earth....Mars is a lot closer to us than the sun (about 50 million miles closer!!)....so it takes light that is reflected from Mars to Earth a lot less time...

If what you were saying was true, it would have taken that probe a hell of a lot longer to get to Mars than just 7 months....


Thats how the best and most accurate information gets posted out here... somone like me takes a shot and gets corrected...

Next thing, you'll be saying the whole thing is taking place in a Hanger in New Mexico. Hawks probably in on it.

[BillW]

Originally posted by PaceAdvantage
Hold on there mister....I think you got things mixed up a bit....it only takes light 7 seconds to travel from the Sun to the Earth....Mars is a lot closer to us than the sun (about 50 million miles closer!!)....so it takes light that is reflected from Mars to Earth a lot less time...

If what you were saying was true, it would have taken that probe a hell of a lot longer to get to Mars than just 7 months....

Another correction :D

PA, you're thinking of the moon (7-8 Secs.) The sun is actually about 8 mins. Mars is about 10 Mins ... the time it takes for the radio signals (and pictures) to travel. It takes them 20 mins to send commands because of the round trip.

It's farther than the sun now because we are not aligned with Mars relative to a radial line extending from the sun.

Kinda makes you realize how big this universe we live in is. The nearest star is about 4.5 lightyears away, and it took us 7 months just to get 10 lightminutes out!

Bill

[PaceAdvantage]

Actually, I corrected myself before I saw your post Bill (my post was edited at 9:50), but thanks. The corrector gets corrected....see Suff, it runs all ways....LOL

[Suff]

Originally posted by BillW
Another correction :D

get 10 lightminutes out!

Bill

so we are in fact looking back ten minutes right Bill? its not the present what we see... its 10 minutes light years in the past correct? My knowledge is limited..but I understand the basic concept to be what i am describing ,,,,any idea?

[Suff]

Originally posted by PaceAdvantage
Actually, I corrected myself before I saw your post Bill (my post was edited at 9:50), but thanks. The corrector gets corrected....see Suff, it runs all ways....LOL

Someone just sent me a Note saying you were seen running around Meadowlands with Walter Case last week. I know your trying to protect a Friend.. but give us some editorial liberty.

[BillW]

Originally posted by Suff
so we are in fact looking back ten minutes right Bill?


Yep. If you were looking at it through a telescope, the light you would see has been traveling toward you for about 10 mins. or so.

Light travels about 1 foot per nanosecond, so when sitting across the table from someone, you are actually seeing them about 5 nanoseconds ago. :eek:

Bill

[BillW]

The spirit has hiccuped, no resolution or recovery yet.The second craft is scheduled to hit Sat nite/Sun. morning. Another nite without sleep :).

Bill

[Tom]

Could it be that the rover was "captured" by Martians?
Or it was a union rover and its contract is up?
Or it heard Bush was coming to find WMD and fled to Venus?
If it went to Venus, will we soon hear a message, "Can you hear me NOW?"

[VetScratch]

Here is some lighter reading about the Mars issue:

http://weeklywire.com/ww/09-29-97/nash_cover.html

I have a hunch Woody Eargle did his time working in the prison library. :)

[Derek2U]

hehe could it be that the Mars Rover encountered Martians who
don't like a littered dustscape? Zogby poll of RED states (Pro
Bush): 32% said Bush stole the election; BLUE states, 42%.
hehe ... Electronic Voting machines ne1? see the technology at
www.blackboxvoting.com ..... hey why worry, Bush's tax cuts
created 1K jobs in December, yipeee hooray. Kodak in Rochester
NY said it will cut ~~13K jobs by dec '06. ~~2.5Mil jobs have
been lost since #43 came in. The Bushies caved in2 the NRA
again ... just keep gun-purchase records for 24 hrs then its ok
2 destroy them ... hehe ...Isn't that outta sync w/ homeland sec?
Obesity linked 2 Sugar? the WHO thinks so & advises, Yawn, Eat
more fruits & veggys & exercise more, but wait, the Bushies say
the science behind that is NOT PROVEN!! them SugaTrade groups
speed dial Tommy Thompson & presto, "accordin 2 a new study
by NewT Rumsfed Ridge Rice et als, Suga is Ur 5th food group.
hehe .... ah, i gotta face anothr day on Wall St just making Lots
$$$$ , isn't life wonderful? hehe

[JustRalph]

You Linux Guys should get a kick out of this one..........

http://www.justralph.com/mars.jpg

[MarylandPaul@HSH]

Originally posted by PaceAdvantage
So, when you look at Mars, you are seeing what happened 3.5 minutes ago...

Remember the pictures from Neptune in '89? If I remember correctly, it took nearly 4 hours for the radio signals to reach earth. Boggles the mind...

When I did a quick search to remind myself of the year Voyager 2 reached Neptune, the site I found had some interesting facts, among them that Neptune is about 3 billion miles from the sun, and the avg. surface temperature on Triton, Neptune's largest moon, is -391F. Bring your mucklucks!

http://www.solarviews.com/eng/vgrnep.htm

Great reading. I love this stuff...

[JustRalph]

I swear I just heard on the radio that the Mars Rover was sending a signal that it had " rebooted itself 61 times since contact was lost and was unable to continue to boot up...."

I was joking when I posted the picture a few hours ago......damn!

[Derek2U]

hey BOB luvd ur show but did u know u weren't known in
australia. kinda ironic but i guess u knew that. RIP funny guy.

[Tom]

Originally posted by JustRalph
I swear I just heard on the radio that the Mars Rover was sending a signal that it had " rebooted itself 61 times since contact was lost and was unable to continue to boot up...."

I was joking when I posted the picture a few hours ago......damn!


You mean this thing is powered by....Windows!?!?!?

[BillW]

T minus 7 hours and counting to Opportunity landing.

Guess I'll miss the 10th at HOU this evening :).

Bill

[JustRalph]

Bill.....

I am watching this thing on the NASA channel. Wouldn't you like to have the contract for Providing the Computer Monitors for that place? The Laptop contract would be pretty nice too.

The Television coverage isn't exactly wide world of sports, but damn sure fascinating........

Bill.....you believe the spirit is acting up due to a bad "flash card"

what a trip...... huh?

[BillW]

Originally posted by JustRalph
Bill.....

I am watching this thing on the NASA channel. Wouldn't you like to have the contract for Providing the Computer Monitors for that place? The Laptop contract would be pretty nice too.

The Television coverage isn't exactly wide world of sports, but damn sure fascinating........

Bill.....you believe the spirit is acting up due to a bad "flash card"

what a trip...... huh?

They think it is recoverable as part of its "acting up" was done at night and it ran down its batteries. NASA-TV coverage is great isn't it? Back to the TV :)

Bill

[Dick Schmidt]

The guys I know at JP tell me that everyone is looking SO relieved. They just didn't need another breakdown.

The second lander should be arriving on the surface of Mars, on the other side of the planet, just about now. Apparently everyone is back in "kids in toyland" excited mode.

Dick

Who looks at the night sky and wonders . . . "What the hell???"

[JustRalph]

http://maasdigital.com/mervideo-medium.html

This is a very nice full length version of the animation prepared by Nasa.......if you know how, you can save it locally to your hard drive. It is very well done........you may have to hit the "Play" button to get it to start..........it is a quicktime mov file

[Derek2U]

great video clip amazing engineering

[Suff]

I had read that the very first craft to land on MARS, communicated for all but 20 seconds before shutting down and never to be heard from again.

That was the Russians.

Our Probe lasted longer. At first they said it might have been STORMS over Australia that sent the Computer into Safe mode.

But I have read that the Magnetic Field ( or lack thereof ) on Mars is something we have'nt totally grasped yet. Our computer technology will not work as "assumed" or hoped for in that climate.

Its a wild place... it'll take a bit to figure it out... but we will.

[Suff]

When the man from NASA told Homer Simpson he could'nt live in space because it had no Air..! Homer Responded... Of course there is.. that why they have the AIR and SPACE Museum.

But on the subject of space. Check out the exploding star that the HUBBLE caught this week. This is worth a look.

I bumped into it snooping the NASA site this morning.


http://hubblesite.org/newscenter/newsdesk/archive/releases/1996/07/

[ceejay]

It looks like Opportunity is near some rock outcrop. Maybe even some sedimentary (cross-bedded) rocks. Way cool!

[Shacopate]

JustRalph,

That is the coolest thing I've seen in a long time. (your link)

Stanley Kubrick would be proud.

Hopefully, a DVD of the entire Mars adventure will be available when its over.

[BillW]

Originally posted by Suff
When the man from NASA told Homer Simpson he could'nt live in space because it had no Air..! Homer Responded... Of course there is.. that why they have the AIR and SPACE Museum.

But on the subject of space. Check out the exploding star that the HUBBLE caught this week. This is worth a look.

I bumped into it snooping the NASA site this morning.


http://hubblesite.org/newscenter/newsdesk/archive/releases/1996/07/

Suff,

If you're into space pics, check out the picture of the day:

http://antwrp.gsfc.nasa.gov/apod/astropix.html

I make it my home page on my browser.

Bill

[JustRalph]

Originally posted by Shacopate
JustRalph,

That is the coolest thing I've seen in a long time. (your link)

Stanley Kubrick would be proud.

Hopefully, a DVD of the entire Mars adventure will be available when its over.

It was nicely done huh? If you want to save it locally to your hard drive you can go into explorer "tools" internet options, settings (on the temp file section) and then choose "view files" and locate it. The best way to do this is to clear your internet files first....shut down your browser and then go back to the page and run the video. Then go into the files and find it. It will have an icon like this

http://www.justralph.com/q_movie_icon.jpg
then you can copy it to your desktop etc........

[Shacopate]

I did everything you said in regards to saving it on the hardrive.

Do you have to be on-line to view it?

When I try it off-line, I get an error message:

"Couldn't open the file."

It works fine as long as I'm connected, but I would like to be able to show it to some students.

Broadband won't be available there.

[JustRalph]

Try this link......right click and choose "save target as"

http://www.justralph.com/Mars_rover_animation.mov

or just go to

www.justralph.com and download it........

[Shacopate]

Ralph,

That fixed it, thanks.

[BillW]

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A61578-2004Jan29.html?nav=hptoc_n

Appears the 1st rover is coming back to health. Looks like something they didn't think of in their operational procedures. This experience will prevent the problem from occuring in the 2nd rover.

Bill

[Suff]

Originally posted by BillW
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A61578-2004Jan29.html?nav=hptoc_n

Bill

They got them Both working last night.

http://www.cnn.com/2004/TECH/space/02/02/mars.rovers.ap/index.html

[BillW]

Next NASA TV coverage tomorrow (Wed.) at noon EST then same time Thurs. and Fri.

All three are the standard panel format news briefings.

Bill