[meteorite-list] NASA Phoenix Lander Bakes Sample, Arm Digs Deeper

Wed Jun 18 02:51:42 EDT 2008

Hi, Pete, List,

    This mission was named Phoenix in recognition
of the fact that like the mythical Phoenix, it rose from
the ashes of the dead! Once upon a time, there were
two Mars missions that died: the 2001 Mars Surveyor
lander was cancelled in 2000, and the Mars Polar Lander
was lost on Mars in 1999.

    Demonstrating the inscrutable wisdom that politicians,
beaurocrats, and authorities often possess that we lowly
groundlings lack, the 2001 Mars Surveyor Lander was
canceled after it was already built and paid for. (Anybody
remember the Superconducting Super Collider?)

    At any rate, the 2001 Mars Surveyor Lander had been
kept in storage at Lockheed Martin clean room in Sunnyvale.
And there were extra "stay-at-home" duplicates of some
instruments for the Polar Lander, and there was a bit here
and there, and there were projects without a vehicle or hope
of getting another one...

    Upshot: for a lousy $386 million, which includes the launch
and all tips for room service, You The Taxpayer get a whole
new Mars Mission.  Quit whining.  For comparison, we spend
$343 million each and every day in Iraq doing whatever it is
that we're doing there.

    Actually, I lied. Phoenix needed an extra $31 million beyond
the budget of $386 million and was almost cancelled over it.
The altimeter was from the Mars Polar Lander (you know, the
one that crashed). It seems that, hmm... a faulty altimeter may
have been to blame for that.

    It's taken from the one used in F-16 fighter planes. Some
software problems on the F-16 altimeter were fixed, but the
altimeter for Phoenix did not get the software upgrade. They
spent about six months fixing the gizmo, driving up costs.
And, hey! It worked, didn't it?

    Additionally, they had to pay for searching for a boulder-free
landing spot, using the Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter which, yes,
charges for its services, even to other missions, because every
spot they picked had boulders. There's a helluva lot of boulders
on Mars...

    <quote>  The partnership developing the Phoenix mission
includes: the University of Arizona, NASA's Jet Propulsion
Laboratory, Lockheed Martin Space Systems in Denver and
the Canadian Space Agency, which is providing weather
instruments. Peter H. Smith of the University of Arizona, Lunar
and Planetary Laboratory heads the Phoenix mission. <unquote>

    Thanks.

    Born from the ashes it may be, but Phoenix will die in the cold.
It's going into summer in the Martian Arctic; the mission lifetime is
about 150 days. Phoenix won't survive winter.

    I also notice news people describing the Phoenix as having
landed at Mars's "North Pole," even people on this List. If you
were aliens going to land on Earth, would you land on the dead
center of Antarctica? Why?

    Phoenix is on the southern edge of the "Boreal Vastness"
(translating from the Latin name); it is above the Martian Arctic
Circle, barely (68.35 deg North). For a location comparison
by latitude, think of landing in the Northwest Territories of
Canada. The "Boreal Vastness" is a flat featureless low-lying
that covers about the upper third of Mars; many think it is
an ancient sea bed.

    Your criticisms might be to the point if we belonged to a
species and lived in a culture that made rational and intelligent
long-term plans to do the things that are truly essential and
important to them.

    If you know of such a place, let me know.

    I sincerely hope you can convince somebody to land a
multi-ton rompin' rover with nuclear eight-wheel drive, power
take-off drills on both ends, linear laboratory analysis machines
with continuous pass-through of Martian samples and 18
experiments online in each one (let's have four of'em) and
a sample return rocket that sends 100 kg of Martian samples
up to Martian orbit to be returned to Earth.

    Let's have two, if you're in the mood...

Sterling K. Webb
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
----- Original Message ----- 
From: "Pete Shugar" <pshugar at clearwire.net>
To: <Meteorite-list at meteoritecentral.com>; <mexicodoug at aim.com>
Sent: Monday, June 16, 2008 9:21 PM
Subject: Re: [meteorite-list] NASA Phoenix Lander Bakes Sample,Arm Digs 
Deeper

I agree that we have learned tons more than what we did know.
What I am wondering is if the lander can move to new locations or
will it be only at this one location. Otherwise we will learn a lot
about a very small patch of Mars. I think the other 2 rovers will provide
more science due to examining many places instead of just the one small
patch of Mars that will checked. I agree it will be very a intensive
in depth look at a small spot.
It may sound as an  aggressive criticism for your taste, but that is a
truth.
If the Lander could move to new locations and dump it's ovens for
use in new experiments we would have generated a larger amount of
science.
Maybe it's just that I'm not as up on this probe as I am on the other two.
Pete

----- Original Message ----- 
From: <mexicodoug at aim.com>
To: <Meteorite-list at meteoritecentral.com>
Sent: Tuesday, June 17, 2008 7:30 PM
Subject: Re: [meteorite-list] NASA Phoenix Lander Bakes Sample,Arm Digs
Deeper

> "I guess that means only 8 experiments and then it becomes a high dollar
> garbage can.."
>
> Pete, "only?"  "high dollar garbage can?"??  That sounds a bit too
> aggressive of a criticism for my taste in light of the historic
> accomplishments in progress on the frigid Polar surface of Mars.
>
> Have you ever cleaned out an oven?  Decontaminated it without having any
> water or liquids?  I guess NASA preferred not to wrap the baked goods in
> aluminum baggies and not make the Mars under the lander a garbage heap of
> disposable crap and contaminating solvents.  I'm not critical of that.
>
> I don't what you are thinking, but 8 oven cycles sounds like 8 times
> infinity more quality oven time than "we" had before.
>
> Best wishes,
> Doug
> PS Speaking about learning to clean out the oven, I recommend to you the
> comedy movie, "A Day without a Mexican", and think Mars instead of
> California :)  If that is too testy, how 'bout "To Build a Fire" by Jack
> London?
>
>
> -----Original Message-----
> From: Pete Shugar <pshugar at clearwire.net>
> To: Mike Bandli <fuzzfoot at comcast.net>; 'Ron Baalke'
> <baalke at zagami.jpl.nasa.gov>; 'Meteorite Mailing List'
> <meteorite-list at meteoritecentral.com>
> Sent: Mon, 16 Jun 2008 6:26 pm
> Subject: Re: [meteorite-list] NASA Phoenix Lander Bakes Sample, Arm Digs
> Deeper
>
>
> I guess that means only 8 experiments and then it becomes a high dollar
> garbage can.. Pete
> ----- Original Message ----- From: "Mike Bandli" <fuzzfoot at comcast.net>
> To: "'Pete Shugar'" <pshugar at clearwire.net>; "'Ron Baalke'"
> <baalke at zagami.jpl.nasa.gov>; "'Meteorite Mailing List'"
> <meteorite-list at meteoritecentral.com> Sent: Tuesday, June 17, 2008 3:20 PM
> Subject: RE: [meteorite-list] NASA Phoenix Lander Bakes Sample,Arm Digs
> Deeper
>> Hi Pete, Unfortunately, all eight of the ovens cannot be emptied or
>> re-used
> for > other
>> tests. I believe I remember hearing it had something to do with
> saving
>> weight on the craft. Best, Mike Bandli -----Original Message----- 
>> From: meteorite-list-bounces at meteoritecentral.com
>> [mailto:meteorite-list-bounces at meteoritecentral.com] On Behalf Of
> Pete
>> Shugar Sent: Monday, June 16, 2008 12:40 PM To: Ron Baalke; Meteorite
>> Mailing List Subject: Re: [meteorite-list] NASA Phoenix Lander Bakes
>> Sample,Arm
> Digs
>> Deeper My question is: If there are only 8 ovens on the Lander, what
>> happens when they are all full? Is there a provision to dump the ovens
>> and reuse them? Pete ----- Original Message ----- > From: "Ron Baalke"
> <baalke at zagami.jpl.nasa.gov>
>> To: "Meteorite Mailing List" <meteorite-list at meteoritecentral.com> Sent:
>> Tuesday, June 17, 2008 12:54 PM Subject: [meteorite-list] NASA Phoenix
>> Lander Bakes Sample, Arm Digs Deeper
>>>
>>> http://www.jpl.nasa.gov/news/news.cfm?release=2008-111b NASA Phoenix
>>> Lander Bakes Sample, Arm Digs Deeper Jet Propulsion Laboratory June 16,
>>> 2008 TUCSON, Ariz. -- One of the ovens on NASA's Phoenix Mars Lander
>>> continued baking its first sample of Martian soil over the weekend,
>>> while the Robotic Arm dug deeper into the soil to learn more about
> white
>>> material first revealed on June 3. "The oven is working very well and
>>> living up to our expectations,"
> said
>>> Phoenix co-investigator Bill Boynton of the University of Arizona,
>>> Tucson. Boynton leads the Thermal and Evolved-Gas Analyzer (TEGA),
> or
>>> oven instrument, for Phoenix. Phoenix has eight separate tiny ovens to
>>> bake and sniff the soil and look for volatile ingredients, such as
>>> water. This baking is
> performed
>>> at three different temperature ranges. On Sol 18 (June 12), the lander's
>>> Robotic Arm dug deeper into the
> two
>>> trenches, informally called "Dodo" and "Goldilocks," where white
>>> material was previously found. This created one large trench, now
> called
>>> "Dodo-Goldilocks." "We have continued to excavate in the Dodo-Goldilocks
>>> trench to
> expose
>>> more of the light-toned material, and we will monitor the site,"
> said
>>> Robotic Arm lead scientist Ray Arvidson of the University of
> Washington,
>>> St. Louis. "If the material is ice, it should change with time.
> Frost
>>> may form on it, or it could slowly sublimate." Sublimation is the
>>> process where a solid changes directly into gas. The Dodo-Goldilocks
>>> trench is 22 centimeters wide (8.7 inches) and
> 35
>>> centimeters long (13.8 inches). The trench is seven to eight
> centimeters
>>> (2.7 to 3 inches) deep at its deepest. The deepest portion is
> closest to
>>> the lander. The white material is located only at the shallowest part of
>>> the
> trench,
>>> farthest from the lander, indicating that it is not continuous
>>> throughout the excavated site. The trench might be exposing a ledge,
> or
>>> only a portion of a slab, of the white material, according to
> scientists.
>>>
>>> The Phoenix mission is led by Peter Smith with project management at
> JPL
>>> and development partnership at Lockheed Martin, located in Denver.
>>> International contributions come from the Canadian Space Agency; the
>>> University of Neuchatel, Switzerland; the universities of Copenhagen
> and
>>> Aarhus, Denmark; Max Planck Institute, Germany; and the Finnish
>>> Meteorological Institute. For more about Phoenix, visit:
>>> http://www.nasa.gov/phoenix and http://phoenix.lpl.arizona.edu.
> ------------------------------------------------------------------------ 
>
>>>
>>> Media contacts: Guy Webster 818-354-6278 Jet Propulsion Laboratory,
>>> Pasadena, Calif. guy.webster at jpl.nasa.gov Dwayne Brown 202-358-1726 NASA
>>> Headquarters, Washington dwayne.c.brown at nasa.gov Sara Hammond
>>> 520-626-1974 University of Arizona, Tucson shammond at lpl.arizona.edu
>>> ______________________________________________
>>> http://www.meteoritecentral.com Meteorite-list mailing list
>>> Meteorite-list at meteoritecentral.com
>>> http://six.pairlist.net/mailman/listinfo/meteorite-list
>> ______________________________________________
>> http://www.meteoritecentral.com Meteorite-list mailing list
>> Meteorite-list at meteoritecentral.com
>> http://six.pairlist.net/mailman/listinfo/meteorite-list
> ______________________________________________
> http://www.meteoritecentral.com Meteorite-list mailing list
> Meteorite-list at meteoritecentral.com
> http://six.pairlist.net/mailman/listinfo/meteorite-list
> ______________________________________________
> http://www.meteoritecentral.com
> Meteorite-list mailing list
> Meteorite-list at meteoritecentral.com
> http://six.pairlist.net/mailman/listinfo/meteorite-list
>

______________________________________________
http://www.meteoritecentral.com
Meteorite-list mailing list
Meteorite-list at meteoritecentral.com
http://six.pairlist.net/mailman/listinfo/meteorite-list 