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NASA's Mars Odyssey Enters Orbit

Posted by Hemos on from the get-it-where-it-needed-to-go dept.

maddmike writes "Nasa's Mars explorer Odyssey is scheduled to brake and orbit about Mars today at 7:30PDT. Among the mission's objectives are to understand Mars' climate and geological history and to search for signs of life sustaining environments including water. Main web site is at the JPL website." Update: 10/24 13:12 GMT by T : The BrownFury writes cites a Space.com summary which says "The Mars Odyssey spacecraft appears to have succeeded Tuesday night in one of the most tricky and critical parts of its missions by slipping into orbit around the Red Planet."

33 of 129 comments (clear)

  1. Cool! by Bob+McCown · · Score: 5, Funny
    That means our cloaking technology was successful against those pesky aliens that have blasted last few probes.

    Onward to planetary colonization!

  2. This is excellent news! by Scott+Lockwood · · Score: 2, Interesting

    This is EXACTLY the kind of good press Nasa needs right now - Hopefully, if we can avoid further mishaps, we can get the kind of funding we need to put people on Mars in my lifetime. If we can find water on the planet, think of the possibilities.

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  3. I hope they know what they are doing by TheMMaster · · Score: 2, Flamebait

    understand Mars' climate and geological history and to search for signs of life sustaining environments including water.
    let's hope they don't mix up degrees Celcius and Fahrenheit and Liter and gallon..... else these "colonists" are in for a BIG surprise ;-)

    --
    Fighting for peace is like fucking for virginity
  4. Wow by the_other_one · · Score: 2, Funny

    In the picture on the main web site the spacecraft looks very much like the main part of it is a Furby. Now that's a hack!

    --
    134340: I am not a number. I am a free planet!
  5. It's about time :-) by Anton+Anatopopov · · Score: 3, Interesting
    I guess by the law of averages at least one NASA mars probe would eventually get through :-)

    Seriously though, this is good news, the more data we have on Mars, the easier it will be when we attempt to colonize it.

    I can't help thinking that we are not spending enough money on cool space research like this. Why does congress always seem to resent paying for NASA ?

    NASA is a clear demonstration to the world of Americas ingenuity and power. I think at times like these we should be looking to provide them with more funding rather than cutting their budgets. After all, space research has lots of practical spin-offs, like teflon for example.

    1. Re:It's about time :-) by Skinny+Rav · · Score: 2, Interesting

      Seriously though, this is good news, the more data we have on Mars, the easier it will be when we attempt to colonize it.

      Sending unmanned probes: of course
      Sending a manned mission: why not?

      But to colonise it? Give me just one reason to justify such an incredibly expensive task.

      Of course, we should explore space, not only because of spin-offs or "Americas ingenuity and power", but because of the everpresent human curiosity, which is the force behind most of the fundamental research.

      But colonisation is something completely different. And BTW, what do you mean by colonisation? Sending a couple of scientists for a year or something, like to an orbital space station? Or maybe terraforming of Mars? In this case let us maybe start with terraforming Sahara.

      Rav

    2. Re:It's about time :-) by MrDolby · · Score: 2, Interesting

      "But to colonize it? Give me just one reason to justify such an incredibly expensive task. "

      It's simple, the human race will have a much better chance of survival if we start spreading out. Also, colonization does not require us to change or terraform all of mars. With the right equipment it should be theoretically possible to sustain a small population of humans indefinitely. This is one of the main reasons behind these probes, to determine what kind of raw materials there are available to work with that could sustain human life on mars for a long term/permanent stay.

    3. Re:It's about time :-) by anzha · · Score: 3, Insightful

      Why does Congress resent paying for NASA? Pretty good question. Think about it though.

      The short answer is that NASA happens to be demonstrating that it's rather incompetant. Flamebait? Karma killer? Perhaps, but think about it.

      Shuttle? Years delayed and expensive as h*ll to operate. Space station? Ditto.

      X Vehicles? Let's take a look there!

      X-33 was cancelled for starting to run down that same route, and they picked the winning Lockmart proposal because it was full of nifty tech, not based on the stated goals of the X program (much cheaper access to orbit using SSTO technologies).

      X-34 was killed because MSFC wanted to incorporate THEIR engine instead of the original one (*GASP* it was delayed and overbudget...)

      X-30? The National Aerospace Plane fell the way of the X-33, but back in the early 90's.

      Manned spacflight at NASA has been an embarassment for some time for its screwups.

      On the bright side, look at the unmanned probes recently. Sehr gut! Pathfinder, Global Surveyor, DS-1, Lunar Prospector, etc, etc...

      BUT...when NASA f*cks up like say with the Mars 98 missions: English to metric unit conversion problems crash one probe into Mars. WTF!?! These are supposed to be the best and brightest and make THAT stupid a mistake! The royal screwups in the lander mission are ...ummm...amazing.

      Good and bad, Goldin did get one thing right in that he said that for NASA to be trusted any time soon with the budget to go to Mars manned style they'd have to fix - budgetwise - the ISS program. It didn't happen.

      On sci.space.policy, Gary Hudson, of Rotary Rocket and more fame, made the following remark when someone suggested that he be nominated to take over NASA. . .and politically, that's about as likely as slashdot deciding that they're going to run IIS.

      In short, NASA is a wreck.

      Now. Why do you think Congress resents spending money on NASA? Money isn't the main problem here...

      --
      Do you know why the road less traveled by is littered with the bones of the unwary?
    4. Re:It's about time :-) by s20451 · · Score: 3, Insightful

      In short, NASA is a wreck.

      NASA is no different from any other sci/tech organization. However, they have the combined disadvantages of very high risk projects and intense public scrutiny.

      Example:

      NASA engineer writes a bug in code: $300 million spacecraft pancakes into the Martian plains; elected officials demand answers; public wonders why NASA is full of buffoons who can't do something as "simple" as launching a spacecraft into orbit around another heavenly body on a shoestring budget.

      Microsoft engineer writes a bug in code: Another MS engineer is assigned to write a Service Release; yet another engineer is assigned to correct the bugs in the Service Release. Resulting security holes lead to viruses costing billions in lost productivity, according to some estimates. Elected officials defend free enterprise; public doesn't care.

      Linuk kernel hacker writes a bug: Another hacker finds and corrects the bug; elected officials and public don't give a rat's ass.

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    5. Re:It's about time :-) by ChadN · · Score: 2

      I work at NASA Ames (but not FOR NASA; I'm a contractor). I have a Master's degree from Stanford, and during the dot-com days (and perhaps even now), I could have left for a LOT more money. Many of my colleages did (the more competent ones). The pay is just NOT competative for the people with great talents; but I like my work, and now that many people have been layed off, I'm still working, and doing long term development projects (that's a benefit for me).

      That said, I make a decent wage, and am not complaining. But we always have a hard time recruiting good programmers, engineers, etc. because the pay is generally less these days.

      --
      "It's overkill, of course. But you can never have too much overkill." - Anonymous Slashdot Coward
    6. Re:It's about time :-) by ChadN · · Score: 2

      Oh, one more thing. We still do some NEAT things here, and we need good people to help turn them into to commercial technology (or at least releasable technology for others to benefit from). We also do lots of safety related work that is non-proprietary, for example. So, if you are looking for a good job these days, definitely look into NASA. We are in need of good people!

      --
      "It's overkill, of course. But you can never have too much overkill." - Anonymous Slashdot Coward
  6. What's Next.... by cybrpnk · · Score: 4, Interesting

    There are three instruments on Odyssey. One is a gamma spectrometer that will be able to map the presence of permafrost and subsurface ice - obviously important. A second is an infrared spectrometer - not only will it be able to make a geological survey map of the minerals on the surface, it will be able to locate "hot spots" on the surface where there might still be liquid water and perhaps even life. The third instrument is a radiation monitor that was supposed to measure the dose an astronaut would receiv on a Mars mission. It appears to be broken, one hopes not from excesive radiation exposure.....

  7. Teflon was *not* a spinoff. by kaszeta · · Score: 3, Informative
    After all, space research has lots of practical spin-offs, like teflon for example.

    Why does everyone feel the need to falsely attribute various inventions as space program spinoffs?

    Teflon was invented in 1938, well before anything that could even remotely be considered modern space research.

    Don't get me wrong, space research is good, and it produces a valuable product: knowledge.

    False attributions to the space program don't help with their budget problems, though. I'm not blaming you, however, NASA themselves is quite guilty of exaggeration.

  8. Why can't we just sned a KH11? by glrotate · · Score: 2, Interesting

    Can anyone tell me why we just can't send a KH11 sattellite to Mars? It would give us all the imagery we would ever want and answer the questions we keep asking.

    1. Re:Why can't we just sned a KH11? by Wyatt+Earp · · Score: 5, Interesting

      Because a KH-11 is heavy.

      http://www.fas.org/spp/military/program/imint/xk h- 12.htm

      14 tons for a KH-11, 18 tons for the Improved Crystal.

      Niether the Americas, ESA or Proton have rockets with the throw-weight to chuck 18 tons of KH-11 to Mars.

      http://www.astronautix.com/lvs/atlsiiib.htm
      The Atlas III can launch 4,500 kg. to a Geosynchronous transfer trajectory

      http://www.astronautix.com/lvs/dellarge.htm
      The Delta IV Large can launch 10,843 kg. to a Geosynchronous transfer

      http://www.astronautix.com/lvs/ariane5.htm
      The Ariane 5 can launch 6,800 kg. to a Geosynchronous transfer

      Shuttle might do it - 24,000 kgs to LEO, but you'd have to have a big boster. Perhaps if Saturn hadn't been killed, or Energia. But right now no one has the rocket to send something like that to Mars.

    2. Re:Why can't we just sned a KH11? by Jerf · · Score: 2

      Of course, you can still do it, despite those limitations. You can take the satellite up, and start boosting at the right time and slingshotting it around until you have enough energy to get to Mars, virtually for free... except for time. This would take years.

      Money, money, money. It's all about money. (Same reason you can't do what a sibling of this message proposes, which is assemble it in pieces. Of course there's no technical reason that's impossible, just monetary. We have other things to do with launches then to send up a shuttle multiple times for one Mars probe.)

  9. 40 bits a second! by netman133 · · Score: 2, Informative
    From Space.com

    11:01 Odyssey turns on its telemetry and begins transmitting data at 40 bits per second. The Deep Space Network will take several minutes to synchronize their equipment with the pattern in the telemetry because of the slow rate at which the data is being received.

    1. Re:40 bits a second! by Longbow · · Score: 2, Informative

      Actually the 40 bps is just the carrier signal that they use to keep a lock on the spacecraft.

      The 40bps comes through the low gain omnidirectional antenna. Once they are back on the high gain antenna, the signal rate goes back
      up. After the spacecraft is out of danger and back into normal operations the rate is switched back to something like 28,800 bps. Pretty good rate for communicating across 100 million miles.

  10. Long way for a relay by JJ · · Score: 2

    Okay folks, keep in mind we are celebrating the arrival in orbit of basically a relay transmitter. Putting up inteinfrastructure is nice (and yes, I know there are a few instruments on it) but this is mostly just for future probes, so they can have very low power transmitters and still get thru.

    --
    So long and thanks for all the fish . . . !!!
  11. turn off the fault protection software? by guidobot · · Score: 2, Informative

    here's a cool link about the steps they take to get into orbit. my favorite part is that the first step involves 'turning off the fault protection software'. its not as bad as you think, though my immediate reaction was to imagine mission control saying "Well, we're only 100 kilometers away, we should be safe so let's just turn that fault protection stuff off. Or was it 100 miles?"

    1. Re:turn off the fault protection software? by Buran · · Score: 2, Informative

      This was done in order to prevent small errors that won't affect the spacecraft from shutting it down at a bad time. Fault control software on late-model NASA craft causes them to enter into a "safe mode" that shuts down nonessential functions and causes the craft to wait for instructions from Earth.

      If this were to happen during the engine firing -- causing the probe to stop everything and just wait -- it'd sail right on past Mars, a fate which befell some of the earlier lunar probes.

      If this were to happen, Mars Odyssey would be useless anyway... so better to risk the small problems rather than have them come back to bite you in a big way.

      --
      i am a soviet space shuttle
  12. The distance by wiredog · · Score: 2

    The kh-11 is designed to send real-time imagery from an orbital height of approx 200 miles (it often orbits lower) to TDRS type satellites in synchronous orbits at approx 25.000 miles. Mars is a bit further away than that. Now a landsat 7-band thematic mapping satellite with a stronger transmitter would be useful.

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  13. It's the new, innovative orbit that fooled them by hawk · · Score: 2
    They just weren't expecting an orbital trajectory that didn't include the planetary core . . .


    hawk

  14. Distance, reliability by s20451 · · Score: 3, Informative
    1. When the spacecraft first goes into orbit, you want a reliable, simple telemetry signal to indicate the basics of what is happening with the spacecraft. This means a low-gain, wide-beam transmitting antenna. The high-gain antenna will provide higher rates, but must be aimed much more carefully; such a system would not be robust if something went slightly wrong during orbit insertion.
    2. From the Where is Mars Odyssey Right Now? page, the spacecraft is currently 1.53e+11 meters from Earth. Even with a directional antenna, signal power drops with distance squared, so the path loss is on the order of 200 dB. That is, if the transmitter power is (say) 50 watts/m^2 at 1 meter away from the spacecraft, as measured from Earth it would be something like 10^-20 watts/m^2, not counting antenna gains. At those powers you'd be lucky to get 40 bits/s, simply by running into Shannon's limit. (Somebody check my math, I haven't had coffee this morning.) Imagine the communications challenge for Voyager 2, which is now heading out of the solar system at a range of billions of kilometers; or Galileo, which lost its high-gain antenna at Jupiter ...
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  15. No joke by s20451 · · Score: 3, Interesting

    The NASA people talk about the "great galactic ghoul" which lurks somewhere between Earth and Mars, which eats Mars-bound spaceprobes. It's their tongue-in-cheek attempt to explain why roughly half of all Mars probes fail -- some for apparently no reason.

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  16. Touching scene in mission control by Rogerborg · · Score: 5, Funny

    I was watching the mission control footage, when the satellite came out of Mars' shadow, two mission control geeks went to high five each other, and missed. That's NASA for you: nerding it old school. ;-)

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  17. Re:40 bits a second by Buran · · Score: 2, Informative

    ... except that that signal is only the carrier signal off the low-gain antenna. The high-gain antenna, which will be used for transmitting actual data, won't be activated until the probe finishes unfolding itself from cruise mode configuration. That antenna transmits data many times faster (I wasn't able to find the exact transmission speed when I looked for it last night.)

    --
    i am a soviet space shuttle
  18. Re:Searching for water? by Shadowlion · · Score: 2, Informative

    NASA never found water. NASA has gobs of images of the Martian surface which /suggest/ water. Channels on the surface, etc., which look an awful lot like running water made them. There are even some features that hint at ancient oceans.

    However, at the moment, these images are equivalent to ink blots. Yeah, maybe they look like something - but maybe you're just reading into them.

    Odyessey seems like it's going to go a bit beyond that and actually do some surveying of the surface and subsurface for signs of actual water, as opposed to just saying, "Hey, that looks like it might've been made by water a million years ago!"

  19. Last night I knew everything was OK when... by Mzilikazi · · Score: 2, Insightful
    ...I didn't hear anything about it. ;)



    Even though there's more important things going on in the world right now, nothing disappears into the news black hole faster than a successful space mission. A failed mission, on the other hand...

    --
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  20. Re:Nah by stubob · · Score: 2, Funny

    I'd trade one gravity well for what's behind the curtain.

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  21. NASA gets it right finally by Amon+CMB · · Score: 2, Flamebait

    Amazing what NASA can do when they don't use the English system of measurement!

    --


    Men believe what they want. - Caesar
  22. galileo antenna: 10 bps by peter303 · · Score: 2

    The near-disaster Galileo Jupiter probe has been operating satisfactorily for six years at a 10 bps transmission rate. About once a month it makes a close moon flyby, snaps a few dozen pictures and records them on tape. Then during the empty parts of its orbit it tranmits the pictures back to earth at about two per day.

    The main Galileo antenna which was over a thousand times faster failed to open- a near embarassment to NASA. The mission was re-programmed enroute to use the slow antenna, and achieve 70% of the original objectives.

  23. APOD has artist's Rendition by msheppard · · Score: 2

    The APOD (Astronomy Picture of the Day), has a picture of what this MIGHT have looked like... in natural and false-colouring... and as always, tons of informational links.

    M@

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