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Goodbye, Galileo
deglr6328 writes "On the 21st of this month the Galileo Space Probe, which has been orbiting Jupiter for nearly eight years, will plummet fatefully into the crushing pressures and searing heat of that planet's interior. The spacecraft's 14 year journey has brought the discovery of, among other things, the first moon orbiting an asteroid, the first remote detection of life on earth when Carl Sagan used data from an onboard infrared spectrometer to observe the spectral signature of Oxygen in our atmosphere, it has caught snowflakes of Sulfur Dioxide as it flew through the plume of an erupting volcano on Io, snapped pictures of comet Shoemaker-Levy 9 as it smashed into Jupiter's atmosphere and most importantly, provided proof a >60 Km deep ocean on Europa with hints of oceans on Callisto and Ganymede(listen to Ganymede's eerie sounding plasma wind). And all this with scarcely more computing power than a late '70s video game and a maximum data transfer rate of ~120 bits/s over a distance of more than 600 million Km. In a mission spanning three decades, the Galileo space probe has answered many of humanity's questions about space and presented us with the knowledge to ask many more which will be answered by the next generation of Jovian explorer. Goodnight Galileo."
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*_______aaaan_____________________________________ ________C
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I thought Galileo was already dead. Isn't he from the 1600s or something?
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Biatch!
but I would rather have a replica of this space probe in schools/colleges than any number of sports trophies. The amount of hard work and dedication required to do things like this should inspire our youths, instead of their current role models (kobe bryant, et al.)
later,
epic
"Im drowning here, and you're describing the water!"
The reason that it sounds so "eerie" is because it is recorded with a receiver whose channels are harmonically related. A true wideband recording would sound quite different. This is true of the similar Voyager plasma recordings as well.
all this with scarcely more computing power than a late '70s video game
When it comes to real engineering, the fewer resources you need to meet your goals, the better of a job you did. Throwing in larger processors just to you can brag about the power of a Beowulf cluster of those is just a poor job.
Less is more.
Ever notice how when you are required to recite something over and over, the words lose their meaning and blend together, like when you recited the Pledge every single day of the school year? Is this patriotism, or a waste of time?
d uvisuble
b lest
Iplejuhleguhns
tothaflag
uvtheyounighted staits uv umerika
andtothe republik
forwichitstanz
wonnashun
undurgod
in
with liburtyandjustis foroll
Now let us pray,
Cumlorjezus
beeourgest
anletthine
gifstousbe
ahmen
Aim for the stars...and beyond!
This month's issue of popular science has an article also. Click.
I thought they meant the Galileo.
My first reaction was "whaa...? but he's already dead!".
Dropping the spacecraft into the planet just seems wrong! It's like flushing a dead goldfish down the toilet!
So long Galileo! We salute you!
*flush*
What does Uranus smell like?
Bitterly disapointed, Carl Sagan was never able to detect intelligent life on our planet!
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Signature_bloc
It promised a lot, then with the failure of the high-gain antenna, it delivered a lot less than expected.
Both Voyagers sent us a lot less data but the data was publicised much more energetically.
Since the probe has been plauged by malfunctions for some time I agree it is time to let it go. Bye bye...
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Why?! What the fuck is wrong with you?!
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Galileo was not cheap. Neither were the Pioneers or the Voyagers. Look at the return on the investment, though.
NASA has not made a good argument for cheaper = better. The Hubble Space Telescope was flawed when it went up and spent the first three years of its lifespan doing very little compared to its design. We have lost several probes headed Mars. Quality has not been top priority at NASA, and until it is, we're going to continue to see failure after failure, I'm afraid. Galileo wasn't perfect, with deployment problems of its high-gain antenna, but it did not fail entirely, and it did not require humans in suits to go play with it for it to work right. We need that kind of engineering again.
We need to build them like we used to.
Do not look into laser with remaining eye.
This has already been said. Parent fails it!
This article almost made me cry.
Treehugger? Treehugger... Treehugger!
If Galileo is the spark that lights up the gas giant Jupiter, turning it into a second sun, that will be the last straw. We will then have no choice but to make safety the number one priority at NASA.
Sounds to me like the whole moon is infested with Paradroids.
(For the youngin's, here, here, and here.)
Javian explorer? I thought they just changed it Firebird? I'm so confused.
-Dave
I've seen things you people wouldn't believe. Attack ships on fire off the shoulder of Orion. C-beams glittering in the dark by the Tannhauser Gate. All those moments will be lost in time, like tears in rain.
"with scarcely more computing power than a late '70s video game and a maximum data transfer rate of ~120 bits/s"
imagine a beo-wulf cluster of these!!
GENERATION O98346: The first time you see this, copy it into your sig and remove a random number from the generation. T
"maximum data transfer rate of ~120 bits/s"
;)
About the same as all those links will have in 5 minutes
This comment does not represent the views or opinions of the user.
galeieo space probes vent plasma near URanus.
other possible uses for the miracles of communication we've been given:
how does won login/become a member?
imPEACH yOUR presIdent your bush has been marked for auto removal
consult with/trust in yOUR creator. get more oxygen on yOUR brains. seek others of non-aggressive
intentions/behaviours.
...does anyone know the URL for the Ganymede Dep't of Intellectual Property?
There's also a bit of dissention currently about the decision to crash the probe. Apparently, there's enough plutonium on board (34 pounds!) that we'll be donating to the Jovian depths.
I'm not sure I like that idea.
The cure for cancer is coming: Reovirus
From the article: "Obliteration is precisely what nasa intends for the spacecraft. The reason is that Galileo may still harbor some signs of life on Earth: microorganisms that have survived since its launch from the Kennedy Space Center, in Florida, in 1989. If the orbiter were left to circle Jupiter after running out of propellant (barring an intervention, this would likely happen within a year), it might eventually crash into Europa, one of Jupiter's large moons. In 1996, Galileo conducted the first of eight close flybys of Europa, producing breathtaking pictures of its surface, which suggested that the moon has an immense ocean hidden beneath its frozen crust. These images have led to vociferous scientific debate about the prospects for life there; as a result, nasa officials decided that it was necessary to avoid the possibility of seeding Europa with alien life-forms." But I always thought it would be great to colonize another planet with earth's bacteria. :)
But really, wouldn't doing something like that possibly help to set the stage (a ways off) in the future, when we can send a manned crew out towards Jupiter. Just think if we sent hundreds of probes containing simple life like bacteria, maybe we could help to create a more hospitable place. Of course, then you have to worry about the pesky part about it being mostly ocean(frozen nonetheless).
Ironically, Galileo Galilei spent his own last eight years under close house arrest. To pile on the irony, he spent the last five of them blind, in part because he was prevented from consulting a doctor. Maybe these past eight years of clear vision can help make up for that in a small way. But I doubt it.
geez. what a complment, thanks! :-)
- "Hear that?! The percolations are imminent! Cease your ingress!"
One less satellite to gain intelligence and come back looking for its creator.
Here is the transcript of the last Galileo probe to "land on" Jupiter:
Time Event
________ _____
11:04 a.m. Coast timer initiates probe operation
12:46 p.m. Orbiter flyby of Io (~1000 km) (No imaging or spectral data collected)
2:04 p.m. Energetic Particles Investigation (EPI) begins measuring trapped radiation in a region previously unexplored.
5:04 p.m. Probe entry and data relay
5:05:52 p.m. Pilot parachute deployed
5:05:54 p.m. Main Parachute deployed
5:06:02 p.m. Deceleration module jettisoned
5:06:06 p.m. Direct scientific measurements begin
5:06:15 p.m. Radio transmission to orbiter begins
~5:08 p.m. Visible cloud tops of Jupiter reached
5:12 p.m. Atmospheric pressure the same as Earth's sea-level pressure
5:17 p.m. Second major cloud deck is encountered (uncertain)
5:28 p.m. Water clouds entered (uncertain)
5:34 p.m. Atmospheric temperature equal to room temperature on Earth
5:46 p.m. Probe enters twilight
6:04 p.m. End of baseline mission. Probe may cease to operate due to lack of battery power, attenuation of signal due to atmosphere, or being crushed.
6:19 p.m. Orbiter ceases to receive probe data (if still transmitting)
7:27 p.m. Ignition of Galileo main engine (49 minute duration) to insert into Jovian orbit
This was originally said here.
every so often we send a shuttle up, and sometimes it explodes/etc. Why can't we just send some more probes like this? The whole crap with sending people up just doesn't work - we're not getting any better at it. We should instead just send unmanned flights. Imagine the cost savings.
Yeah, the ISS is a great dream...but...what's the point? Zero gravity labs can be mimiced here on earth far cheaper and safer. Sending one shuttle up has an extremely HUGE environmental impact. In mere moments a search brought up some decent points about further problems/inefficiencies. The technology of today is, in theory, much higher than what we had years and years ago. Its time we took our current system, did something like sell it to the chinese (they'll get it anyway, we might as well make the money), and build something with technology newer than 30 years ago. They still use 386 cpu's in the damn thing. Its time to put the entire fleet to rest, and stop paying to maintain it. Just because the cold war is over doesn't mean we don't need to do more than send people up and watch them explode - we need to still push the envelope.
I'm adding you to my friend-list :)
Treehugger? Treehugger... Treehugger!
Yeah -- someday, when we start harvesting diamonds from the erstwhile core of Jupiter, some of it will be radioactive with all that plutonium we dumped in!
In other similar stories, they always mention the small trickle of data that these crafts can return. I always wonder if this represents some physical limitations, or just the state of technology at the time of the probe. If they had more communications potential, they could return all kinds of data, images, even video. Anyone know of background info on space communications?
How do the new probes compare to these old ones in terms of communications capabilties? What sort of xfer rates can new ones support?
What are the limiting factors in space communications? Is it the power of the transmission, under the power limitations of the craft?
neat i'll do the same
- "Hear that?! The percolations are imminent! Cease your ingress!"
Dude, I did a lot of other stuff too. People just don't appreciate enough :(
Actually, if you will notice, this post came BEFORE the other one. That leads me to conclude that the OTHER one is copied.
Stewey
There are 10 kinds of people in the world. Those who understand binary and those who don't.
Haha. Great.
:D
Will you marry me?
Treehugger? Treehugger... Treehugger!
Here's a thought. ...Send it back to Earth, send a Shuttle up there, grab it, return it to Earth, and analyze it for signs of life.
Having spent 10+ years floating around, it might have picked up a thing or two, and might lend some creedence to the panspermia thoery of how life started on Earth. If space is "dirty" with life, surely some of it would have clung to Galileo...?
Other than being massively radioactive, and something that would piss alot of hippies off if we actually DID bring it home, it would make for good science.
Bowie J. Poag
I'm glad they decided to destroy this, unlike some of our other probes. We all know what happened when V'Ger came back, who knows what Galileo could have done.
"Sic Semper Tyrannosaurus Rex."
I doubt the DeBeers people will weep for the shortened lives of whatever slaves they send to mine Jovian diamonds.
It's mission spanned three decades? Uhm. 1989-2003 = 14 years. Three decades = 30 years. Galileo was active is less than half of three decades, and its useful mission was even less of that. Yeah, 1989-2003 technically means 80's, 90's, and 00's, but calling that "three decades" is assinine, misleading, and vaguely dishonest.
Parent is not really Galileo, but a fake. Note the low UID. The real Galileo is this one.
It's the only way to be sure!
is this Euro week on Slashdot?
How on earth am I to interpret > 60 Km? How many miles are that?
First the poll, now this, I'm starting to wonder about the editors bias.
How small a thought it takes to fill a whole life
"but I would rather have a replica of this space probe in schools/colleges than any number of sports trophies. The amount of hard work and dedication required to do things like this should inspire our youths, instead of their current role models" We could start a replica project for it, and make Galileo scooters to probe the neighbourhood! Hey, if people do it with the Star Trek Enterprise, so can we!! http://story.news.yahoo.com/news?tmpl=story2&u=/03 0905/170/562a3.html&e=5&ncid=1756
haha :)! dude, you better watch out, I like guys!
- "Hear that?! The percolations are imminent! Cease your ingress!"
E, si muove!
"Slapping people is fun." - Starla Grady
Carl Sagan != Scientist
60 km. Well, the 4 loop 1-miler on your race course in track and field is always called the "1600 m dash", so 1.6 km = 1 mile. Therefore, 6.4 km = 4 miles, so 64 km = 40 miles. 60 km is 1/16 less than 64, and 1/16=.0625, so multiply that by 10 (.625) and 4 (2.5), and we get that 60 km = 37.5 miles. Easy, when you think about it.
That general method is actually quite useful in general. I've used it to convert liters to gallons (well, a pint's a pound, the world around, g = 32.2 ft/sec, 1 in = 2.54 cm, and water is 1.99 sl/ft^3), and other interesting calculations.
Thing is, though, it's necessary to practice doing these things in your head.
Otherwise, you won't be a geek.
Correct Horse Battery Staple: 72 bits of entropy. Enter "Correct H" into google. When it generates the phrase, that's
Why is there a space shuttle when launching stuff by rocket arguably is cheaper and when we can have such ubercool projects such as galileio! More money to the scientists, less to the politicians!!
Of those to whom much is given, much is required.
So my question is: If this was done with 1970s technology .. Where are the instructions so I can make my own space probe today?
.. whatever we could manage.
Sure, I will need to colaborate with others for the initial push into space and replace some of the more exotic, expensive materials with homegrown equivalents.
I could make a www.spaceprobeclub.com and people from around the world could pool resources to buy a launch (or make one) then our probes could play around and interact in some kind of drifting pool safely outside of a degrading orbit. Might make for a great hobby for a few years, months
Comment removed based on user account deletion
Sneaky, twisted little bugger. He copied an earlier comment and then "someone" anon posted to the earlier comment and said it was a copy-paste dup and pointed to this as the original.
Check out the orignal and look at the first comment and then look at the post I'm replying to. Check the dates/times carefully.
Also note that an anon is already posted in this thread pointing out the problem, but already is modded down. Hopefully my extra point allows a few more people to see what's going on...
haha :)! dude, you better watch out, I like guys!
;P
You've probably heard about this.
If you happen to live in Canada near Ottawa, then maybe I'll consider asking my girlfriend if she doesn't mind
Treehugger? Treehugger... Treehugger!
Anybody else listen to that and go "HEY! That sounds like seagulls!"
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I was going to point out that its Jovians too :)
Frankly, I think people should have more respect; what would you feel like if someone crased 34lbs of plutonium into your back yard!
Ripping an new rectum in the fabric of spacetime.
My god, it's full of stars!
or more topical
My god, it's full of SARS!
"maximum data transfer rate of ~120 bits/s"
Let see. 120 bits/sec for 8 years... thats about 28 gigabytes of data. Not that bad.
-larsch
way to ruin a good troll, dickass
Download and run celestia, the 3D space simulator. It has a pretty model of Galileo in it; fly over to it and you'll get a pretty good idea of its orbit and how things look from its point of view.
Stop it, you two, you're bringing tears to my eyes.
Agreed, but the Pioneers and Voyagers were out there early and were sending back spectacular photographs, which is what the public gets enthused about. By the time Galileo was there, that'd been done several times, so the public was less interested. And they probably don't care at all about the geology of the moons or the make-up of the atmosphere.
I don't know that we should expect anything else.
I'm turning 40 on Sept 21st. Does anyone know a more exact time for the plunge that I can make out a toast in memory of this wonderful machine?
I'm in a Unix state of mind.
1) Protects the child-molesting fag-priests from justice by resorting to bribery and blackmail.
2) Intervenes with the secular democracy in EU, America and Asia when it comes to self-determination regarding birth control (world overpopulation, anyone?!?!) and womens' rights over their own body. No respect for the separation of the church and the state - just like in the radical muslim nations in the Middle East.
3) Hindered the development of modern science by centuries. Don't forget that if we're suddenly facing extinction as we can't stop that asteroid heading our way.
Ok, when a dead president's birthday rolls around we all take a day off work and cook hot dogs in the back yard with the kids.
Dammit, this is far more worthy! I say we all take a moment out of our lives on the 21st and declare it a one-time national engineering/geek/space/technologist holiday; get our our barbies; relax a bit and pour yourself a glass of bubbly and toast the good folks at NASA.
NCAA conducted a two year study found that most schools only broke-even.
Here's an article.
Results like these pose once more the question if manned flights ( with the risk of human life loss ) are really -necessary- at this point in time, or if remote controls ( and "remote presence" ) technologies are enough to conduct the operations and experiments...
Aren't there any animated videos/clips of the trips of these spacecraft as they glide through space and approach the planets? I would like to have them as screensavers...
[...] it has caught snowflakes of Sulfur Dioxide as it flew through the plume of an erupting volcano on Io, snapped pictures of comet Shoemaker-Levy 9 as it smashed into Jupiter's atmosphere
Yes, but what about the attack ships on fire off the shoulder of Orion and the C-beams glittering in the dark near the Tannhauser gate?
Time to die
If the probe had been a human instead of a lump of hardware, Hollywood would be fighting for the fim rights. Unwanted as a child, shuffled from unwilling carer to unwilling carer, finally sent onto its career by a distinctly second rate route. Suffered a dreadful injury as a result of it early-life neglect. But despite all this, triumphed against the odds and earned unimaginable scientific wealth. Now on its deathbead, surrounded by grieving friends and relatives.
Which raise the question: where is its successor? Hollywood will need the sequel: "Galileo II: The return to Jupiter".
But seriously, this one probe, seriously broken, seems to have done more good science than ISS is ever likely to do. And yet the successor has been canned for lack of funds. While not absoultely anti ISS, it does seem that value-for-money has got a bi distorted. Even on the emotional level, the human achievement of fixing and reprogramming the crippled spacecraft is something to be proud of.
Consciousness is an illusion caused by an excess of self consciousness.
http://www.cyberspaceorbit.com/JUPFULLx.htmc le summary- galileo may cause jupiter to ignite into second sun.
arti
granted, some scientists thought the first nuke test might ignite the earth's atmosphere at the time and this led to some heated (no pun intended) internal debate according to richard feynman. of course our atmosphere isn't made from hydrogen and helium, or contain seas of liquid or metallic hydrogen. a little 2010 anyone?
Science does make money for schools. When we get a grant for doing science, the department and/or the university gets a cut. So if a lab gets a $600,000 grant, they'll probably actually get to see only $200,000-$300,000 of it or so, depending (greatly) on the university. For instance, in the grant administration booklet for my university it looks like 49% of a grant goes directly to the university for "Facilities and Administration." Then there are another 70 pages of crud I'm not going to look at which nibbles away the grant further. Given an article in the student paper last year saying with pride that the football team was now one of the few in the country to be so profitable as to hit the break-even point and my university's perverse overspending on athletics and consistent underfunding of maintenence and faculty pay (2nd lowest in the country, baby!), I imagine "Facilities and Administration" is simply a euphanism for "Athletics Department."
If you just look at a university's budget and see X income from grants and Y from ticket sales and etc., and expenditures X/2 for research and 2Y for athletics (after all, only men's football and basketball programs ever have a hope in hell of ever reaching the break even point--sad but true for now) then athletics are just a drain on the university. But I'm not so blinded by my intense hatred of the Athletics Department to say that it doesn't bring in money--it just does so in a very roundabout way. Private donations are very important to the survival of the university. People might donate becuase of a sense of pride in the university or out of nostalgia, but while academic research doesn't rank high on most people's minds for either of these two things, the old football and basketball teams often do. Similarly, a good sports program may grease the wheels a bit for what little funding we get through the state. How much income from private donations and the state can be indirectly attributed to athletics is very hard to say. Does it surpass research grants? Probably at some universities. But it is worth noting that there are schools that do just fine without athletics and still get piles from grants, the state, and private donations.
I have always wondered about NASA being able to create a set of intra-solar system repeaters that they would send out into space, and have them simply repeat signals back from our spacecrafts. That means we could still pick up signals from such spacecrafts as Voyager and Pioneer spacecrafts by having the repeaters send them back to Earth.
As well, this would eliminate the need for high-gain antennas of the likes of what Galileo needed... they could do with a smaller antenna that would need to reach the repeater, and would decrease overall mission risk.
It's interesting to note that Galileo's successor (the Jupiter Icy Moons Orbiter) will use Ion propulsion powered by a nuclear reactor. I believe that this is a first time a spacecraft has been nuclear powered. The Deep Space 1 mission proved that Ion thusters (which operated off of electricity provided by solar panels) were a faster and more efficient method of propulsion, especially over very long distances such as for exploration outside of our solar system.
See the pdf on the fission technology
Isn't that how life was started on earth? :)
Saying your OS is the best because more people use it is like saying MacDonalds make the best food
"I've seen things you people wouldn't believe. Attack ships on fire off the shoulder of Orion. I watched C-beams glitter in the dark near the Tannhauser gate. All those moments will be lost in time, like tears in rain. Time to die." --Roy Batty, Blade Runner
They say the first thing to go is your penis. Well, it's either that or your brain. I forget which...
With 34 pounds of plutonium crashing into our jovial planet Jupiter, with the velocity and mass to find near center, pressure, we may have our second sun. Credit to A. C. Clark 2010 Space odyssey for the Idea yet we may not need a couple of million monoliths. I feel a milion to one odds in outer space is very small. We should'nt leave our little poops along the way of our space exploration. Are we being watched by our LGMs? most likly and I can see them shaking their heads and saying "What a bunch of multi-colored earth trash"
I eat my grapes at room temperature, cuz the cold ones hurt my teeth
omg whats linux?
Galileo will be Europe's own global navigation satellite system, providing a highly accurate, guaranteed global positioning service under civilian control. It will be inter-operable with GPS and GLONASS, the two other global satellite navigation systems. A user will be able to take a position with the same receiver from any of the satellites in any combination. By offering dual frequencies as standard, however, Galileo will deliver real-time positioning accuracy down to the metre range, which is unprecedented for a publicly available system. It will guarantee availability of the service under all but the most extreme circumstances and will inform users within seconds of a failure of any satellite. This will make it suitable for applications where safety is crucial, such as running trains, guiding cars and landing aircraft. The first experimental satellite, part of the so-called Galileo System Test Bed (GSTB) will be launched in late 2004. The objective of this experimental satellite is to characterize the critical technologies, which are already under development under ESA contracts. Thereafter up to four operational satellites will be launched in the timeframe 2005-2006 to validate the basic Galileo space and related ground segment. Once this In-Orbit Validation (IOV) phase has been completed, the remaining satellites will be installed to reach the Full Operational Capability (FOC) in 2008. The fully deployed Galileo system consists of 30 satellites (27 operational + 3 active spares), positioned in three circular Medium Earth Orbit (MEO) planes in 23616 km altitude above the Earth, and at an inclination of the orbital planes of 56 degrees with reference to the equatorial plane. Once this is achieved, the Galileo navigation signals will provide a good coverage even at latitudes up to 75 degrees north, which corresponds to the North Cape, and beyond. The large number of satellites together with the optimisation of the constellation, and the availability of the three active spare satellites, will ensure that the loss of one satellite has no discernible effect on the user.
how many miles are that yall?
lez quit the fussin and the feduin and go throw some chitlins 'n' grits on them there fires big boba joe is makin' in that there oil bare'elle
go sodomize a pig
...couldn't light up Jupiter, the measley small amount of fissionable fuel onboard Galileo won't stand a chance.
On the 21st of this month the Galileo Space Probe, which has been orbiting Jupiter for nearly eight years, will plummet fatefully into the crushing pressures and searing heat of that planet's interior.
And isn't September 21st the first day of Fall? How appropriate.
Want to improve your Karma? Instead of "Post Anonymously", try the "Post Humously" option.
I find it amazing how some of the spacecraft humans have launched have gone beyond the call of duty and provided us with enormous amounts of information, while some have been smashed to bits due to miscalculations before their journey really began.
What can we learn from this? Maybe that we should keep sending crafts into outer space and, overall, things still work out to the benefit of mankind?
JIMO, or Jupiter Icy Moons Orbitor, is the planned successor to Galileo. It will carry with it a nuclear electric propulsion plant. With this much power on board, the spacecraft will not only be able to get to Jupiter much more quickly, it will be able to bounce powerful radar waves off of Europa and measure the thickness of Europa's icy crust.
Nuclear power in space is important, and will allow us to get to other planets quickly.
This is my sig.
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There are 10 kinds of people in the world; those that understand binary and those that do not.
The slashdot article mentions the Gallileo's mission lasting "3 decades". However, as the nasa.gov link states, Galileo was launched in 1989, 14 years ago. The author must be confused with Voyager I and II, which were launched in the 70's.
Craig Steffen
http://www.craigsteffen.net
Without your MBASIC, Galileo would never have succeeded.
So after all these years he's still being pressured by big, pompous gas-bags? When will the guy get a break?
Well, I submited this, but the periodical referenced didn't have enough geek cred. Nonetheless, the article actually has a lot of technical detail. Check it out.
grammar-lesson free since 1999. (rescinded - 2005)
It's worth pointing out that although the reason the high gain antenna failed was because it didn't unfold properly, the reason that it had to unfold in the first place was more related to politics.
Galileo had to be designed to fit into the shuttle cargo bay, and then propel itself out of orbit after being let loose and placed into space, because various political heavyweights had decided that the shuttle should be used to launch it. Making the antenna foldable added even more complexity to an already incredibly complex machine. Having the launch delayed due to Challenger exploding just added to the complexity of the whole operation, and the antenna failed.
The Cassini probe, later launched to Saturn, was designed with a fixed antenna that didn't need to unfold, and launched from the top of a much more suitable rocket. It hasn't suffered anywhere near the same sorts of problems because it simply doesn't have as much complexity that can potentially break.
It's a pity that probes like Galileo, and other space objects like Mir couldn't have been pushed out to space, rather than destroyed. In a few decades time when we have decently fast travel within the solar system, the Smithsonian will be really disappointed that we didn't try and leave these things somewhere where we could pick them up again later.... Oh well....
The New Yorker article on the same subject (the Galileo probe, that is) kept me awake for two hours after I finished it in bed... Goodbye, Galileo.
I also want to note that I think this is probably the first time Slashdot has ever referenced a Philip Roth book... Goodbye, Columbus.
Compared to science, sports requires very little intelligence. That's why sports are so popular. They appeal to the less than average, average and above average. Science only appeals to the above average. To joe sixpack, science is elitist. Sports are not. It really is that simple.
Stick Men
Elton John rededicates his song "Candle in the Wind" to the Galileo space probe, superceding it's dedication to Marilyn Monroe and Princess Diana. Early reports suggest the lyrics of the chorus may be modified to say "And it seems to me you lived your life / Like a candle in plasma wind."