NASA Mars lander freezes to death
By John Lister
NASA’s Phoenix Mars Lander has stopped sending signals back to Earth after five months. Scientists believe it has likely frozen to the robot equivalent of death.
The lander’s demise was pretty much inevitable: it’s solar powered and was struggling to get enough sunlight as Mars went into its own winter months with shorter daylight hours. To add to the problems, the lander is located on the far North of Mars, roughly equivalent to Alaska on Earth.
NASA staff had already remotely shut down most non-essential functions on the lander to extend its life. For the last few days that the lander was responsive, it was in what NASA described as a Lazurus mod. It ceased operations during the night and, although reawakened by the sun the next day, its memory was wiped clean. The last signal came on Nov. 2 and NASA is acknowledging the lander is unlikely to return to any useful state.
The staff’s sadness (many have commented in terms resembling a genuine bereavement) is partially eased by the successful work the lander was able to carry out. Project manager Barry Goldstein said it was a major achievement just to land the device successfully, let alone to get useful data for all but three of the days it was active. It will likely take years to analyze the data the project produced.
The most important finding of the project was that ice can be found under some Martian soil. That logically implies the existence of water, which is a key step towards the possibility that the planet could support living creatures.
The lander also scooped up soil samples and analyzed it with on-board scientific instruments. It revealed that some Martian dirt contains clay minerals, another indication that water may be present, and a type of salt called perchlorate which could act as an energy source for microbes.
(Picture: NASA/JPL-Caltech/University Arizona/Texas A&M University)
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Stumble It!
November 11th, 2008
Couple of things come to mind.
First, congratulations NASA, amazing job.
I just have a couple of questions for them.
I can’t really understand how come electronics can be made to withstand the cold of space but not the relative warmth of a Mars winter.
I also do not really understand how come the solar panels, which folded out once, cannot be made so as to fold away (or into a more safe configuration) during the winter (and so not be damaged/broken off by the weight of ice build-up) until the Martian spring.
These things cost a heap of cash as it is, surely a hibernating probe which might see out a few years is not beyond our abilities?