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Japanese Mars Probe Failing
Anonymous Coward writes "After months of silence and a week of hopeful half-truths, Japanese space officials have finally confirmed that their Mars-bound Nozomi probe is teetering on the brink of failure in its five-year quest to explore the Red Planet. The Nozomi orbiter is one of four spacecraft that are due to converge on Mars in the next two months. The other three probes -- the European Space Agency's Mars Express and NASA's two Mars Exploration Rovers -- are still on track and in good working order, according to the latest status reports. Mars Express is due to enter Martian orbit on Christmas Day and send a British-built Beagle 2 lander to the surface, while the NASA rovers should arrive on Jan. 3 and Jan. 24."
...will it commit harakiri?
Hack your mind out of its sandbox.
The above post is an editorial, the poster cannot and will not be held responsible for all or in part for it's contents
From the article:
Friday's JAXA statement denied one Tokyo press report that probe was doomed to impact Mars and possibly contaminate the planet. Such a scenario would violate an international "space quarantine" treaty.
I know we've had a lot of cool reports that microbes have survived exposure to hard vacuum for extended periods, but do we really have to worry about "contaminating" Mars? The craft was probably sterilized pretty well before being launched. Then, a year and a half ago, it got hit with a solar flare strong enough to make it miss Mars the first time... that should have baked any hitchiking bugs pretty well. And then, there's the latest round of Solar hiccups to take into account.
Finally, if the craft does hit Mars, it's going to do it in a totally uncontrolled manner -- 'cause if they get any control, they'll steer it away. That implies a high velocity, which even in the thin Martian atmosphere should melt the craft into slag.
Extremophile bacteria at molten sulfur vents is one thing, but hitchiking in a blob of ablating steel?
And as far as that "space quarantine" treaty... what exactly is the punishment for sneezing in space?
Stressed? Me? Of course not. Stress is what a rubber band feels before it breaks, silly.
Pity - the more craft we send there, the more we'll all learn.
Simon.
Physicists get Hadrons!
They may have Weapons of Mass Destruction. Maybe they've got oil, too.
I think we should launch a full scale nuclear assault on Mars as soon as possible.
So hopefully the British rover will have tea ready for us when we get there. Jolly good.
"I only speak the truth"
Karma: null(Mostly affected by an unassigned variable)
They spent the whole $2B Japan (mostly) subsidized them this year on a space program, while they're living on international handouts. Time to give back to the people who actually paid for it.
if its martians shooting them down... martians suck! these things take 5 years to get there! the hit like one out of 10 things we send! who can't aim well enough to hit something when you have 5 years to try?
-You're wasting your time. Alfador only likes me.
How much does the average Mars space probe cost?
Everything we send to Mars disappears. Im starting to get scared...
Manipulate the moderator system! Mod someone as "overrated" today.
I keep thinking about those fish that live in caves that we believed were blind from birth, but were actually blinded by our observations, which required orders of magnitude of light more than they were ever accustomed to. Who knows how much Earth biology survives in these probes when they crash land?
Maybe we should put a halt to sending out any more of these things for now and work more on passive observation techniques.
oooo! BattleBots on Mars! Yea, baby!
-k
Generally, bash is superior to python in those environments where python is not installed.
Or maybe it's a LONG FUCKING WAY to Mars?
Possibly?
Oh, and you DO listen to Art Bell too much, if this is the result of it.
Mod me down with all of your hatred and your journey towards the dark side will be complete!
Or maybe Mars is a long way away and it's really hard to build a machine that can be expected to work for months on end whilst being baked and simultaneously frozen after being placed in a vacuum and bombarded with radiation. Then to put this complicated device on top of hundreds of tonnes of high explosive so that you can get it moving fifteen times faster than a rifle bullet with the objective of placing it somewhere near a body only slightly larger than the Moon?
Best wishes,
Mike.
You fail it!
There's a growing sense that even if The Future comes,
most of us won't be able to afford it.
-- Lemmy
At least there's quite a bit of redundancy with the martian probes. With four going there at once it's quite likely that at least one of them will get there.
The martian probe success rate is so bad that maybe space agencies should launch multiple smaller ones with the expectancy that some will fail to reach their destination than put all their hopes on one larger probe.
Two points:
...and why, yes, this is rocket science.
1. If you even know who Art Bell is, then you listen too much.
2. Mars is a very long way away. A Very, Very long way away. It's moving, too, at a good clip. This distance allows more to go wrong on the way than going somewhere closer, like the moon, by an exponential factor.
(One more reason why Mars is no place to raise a kid. Ooooo, I'm channeling Shatner!)
m-
You catch enchiladas by picking them up behind the head and holding them underwater until they don't kick anymore -VeGas
WMD is just another way of saying they have oil.
Ya know, technically, the sept11 attacks used plane fuel (a derivative of crude oil) as a weapon of mass destruction. With that insane logic, Iraq did have WMD and the facilities associated with it.
Of course, Dubbya specifically mentioned nerve gas, bio and nuclear (well, nucular, actually), so that invalidates my semantics, but still...
You can't take the sky from me...
If someone sterilized the bird with something like chlorine monoxide it's a different matter, but I've seen nothing about this and an orbiter wouldn't normally need to be sterilized like a lander. That's why Galileo met its fiery end.
Scientists restrict study to entire physical universe; creationist
learn to spell more right.
you am not too good at it now. it made you to look foolish when you spell wrong words.
Nah.... It's the Europans pissed that we didn't go there first. They'll shoot down one probe per year until we meet their demands (an off ramp to Europa on the interplanetary spaceway next to a MickeyD's).
Only on
When will we stop sending probes and start sending missiles?!!
If Mars Express fails to shoot Beagle 2 into space, the retro-engine will not have enough thrust to brake Mars Express into Martian orbit. Both probes would then fly past the planet and into solar orbit.
Beagle 2 then travels through space for six days before hitting the Martian atmosphere at interplanetary velocity. Beagle 2's onboard transmitter will not come to life until the probe impacts the surface, so you can imagine that those six days will be pretty tense for the ESA teams.
All being well, Beagle 2 and Mars Express should arrive at their destinations safe and well in the small hours of Christmas morning. By the time we're opening our presents here in the UK, they should have received a signal from the Martian surface.
So, here's hoping!
Best wishes,
Mike.
I thought the same exact thing. Then I remembered oh wait I live in the US, same place that now has the Terminator as a major political entity.
It really is disturbing. "Huge Terrorist bombing in Turkey, BUT who cares! Jacko is wacking off lil boys again!"
Made me really sick to my stomach. I guess if it's not 3000 people and happening in our country Bin Laden doesn't matter worth a shit. I'm sure some families in Turkey are glad their country is allied with the United States right now.
-- taking over the world, we are.
Answer: Nothing, cause they got no pockets...
We apologise for the fault in this post. Those responsible have been sacked. -- Signed RICHARD M. NIXON
it's not like this is brain surgery!
[off to the brain surgery forum... "c'mon guys...it's not like this is rocket science!"]
Buy Steampunk Clothing Online!
http://saveie6.com/
Does anyone have any hard data on the statistics of spacecraft survival for all known Mars missions? Am I incorrect?
This is going to be the best episode of Batttlebots ever!
Doc: No wonder this circuit failed. It says "Made in Japan".
Marty McFly: What do you mean, Doc? All the best stuff is made in Japan.
Doc: Unbelievable.
Because it's a Nozomi Express Probe, I can't use my JRPass on it!
They should have launched a Hikari first.
sulli
RTFJ.
Send a giant fighting robot.
That is exactly it! It does not matter if the probe is from the US, Japan, Russia, the EU, or China. The Zhti Ti Kofft have had enough of Earth's snooping.
The Uncoveror: It's the real news.
Not to mention that no one really has the funds to build the super-probes of yesteryear, so this is unfortunately going to happen with greater frequency. Even looking back at the historic Mars missions where the US sent those super-probes, two out of eight failed before reaching Mars. This shows us that it really has nothing to do with Mars, it's a difficult feat to send probes to Mars even with gobs of cash to spend, and it is no less difficult now than it was decades ago.
Fred
"A fool and his freedom are soon parted"
-RMS
Wait a minute, don't we have math and engineering to deal with all those problems (we certainly did in the 60's and 70's)?
But the units matter.
Is it just me, or does anyone else detect a sloppiness in our current program that didn't exist before? Maybe it's a symptom of the "Me! Now!" generation-X (and now gen-Y) attitude (disclaimer: I'm not even 30 yet).
Don't sweat the petty things. But do pet the sweaty things.
Well with the life expectancy of 6 months to 1 years for all of todays electronic products, The warranty is about to run out on the Mars mission space crafts, no wonder its failing, maybe they should have opted for the Extended Service plan. For only an addition $6,500,000 they could have had a 3 year warranty.
If firefighters fight fire and crime fighters fight crime, what do Freedom fighters fight?
Heck did the parent get modded up insightful?!
The martians don't like having their picture taken.
"Freedom means freedom for everybody" -- Dick Cheney
Sure we know how to deal with them. It's called, "More and more layers of redundancy". Unfortunately, more redundancy means more cost and more weight, which translates to even more cost. And in the space-affairs budget environment since the mid-80s, the money's not there. Learn to deal with a 50% failure rate, as opposed to the 25% one of years gone by.
Bravo. Well put!
Cripes.
I guess I'll just stick with their VCR's and TV's.
/* oops I accidentally made a comment, sorry */
Art Bell and his guest are right, even Richard Hoagland!
The problem is that "on-site" service plan isn't offered. So you have to bring it into the shop. But on the plus side "parts and labor" are included in the cost.
Invalid Checksum. Retrying.
They're already cranky about all the stories we write about them, so they're returning the favor by blowing up our probes!
Stupid calots.
SCREW THE ADS! http://adblock.mozdev.org/ Proud user of teh Fox of Fire - Registered Linux User #289618
But do we need any solution? After all, any manned expedition will surely affect Mars more than any probe before. Exploring Mars and fear of contamination are contradictory. There is a saying in Russia, if you are affraid of wolves, then dont explore the forest, meaning that if you want to explore something, you have to overcome your trivial fears.
In theory there is no difference between theory and practice. In practice there is. - Yogi Berra
They knew the OS was failing and yet they still went ahead and used it.
Please can someone enlighten them about our good friend Tux.
Thank you.
There was an article about microwave bombs earlier. Could a narrowband (laser type microwave) deliver power to a sattelite that far out? (The article mentions it's the power system failing)
Shouldn't that be "five-year mission"? This is space, after all. The final frontier.
Yeah if we had limitless funds, we could build great probes that would work 5 times past their expected lifetimes.
-
When you have the "throw more money at the problem to fix it" mentallity every government agency (at least in the US) has, you're not going to find real solutions to problems like this.
It used to be about innovation, pride, and accomplishment.
Probably not, as long as they got the memo that a foot is different than a meter.
come on, guys -- it doesn't take a rocket scientist to.... uh..... nevermind.
Art Bell can be really funny. I like to listen and just marvel at the shoddy logic that he and his guests pull out... my favorite 2 are:
1) Well, if there's no proof that X (doesn't matter what X is) is false, than it's clearly true!
2) X (the gov't, nasa, authority-of-choice) denied it, so you know it must be true!
I feel bad for the occasional decent scientist who comes on the show, and who gets blindsided by some weird question like:
(while explaining that we just got missed (1 million miles) by some big asteroid)
"That's interesting... so, do you think aliens might be behind this? Why isn't the government telling us?"
Now, I'll grant you that there are some weird things out there that science doesn't get yet (millions of credible people see ghosts, aliens, etc.), but this concept of "for lack of proof, any answer will do" is odd. Entertaining though...
"Faith: Belief without evidence in what is told by one who speaks without knowledge, of things without parallel." - A.B.
you listen to too much art bell.
A rare eloquence, a marvelous economy of words; concise, yet expressive; direct, accessible language equally meaningful to the sage and to the barbarian. Moronic, perhaps, yet clear and precise.
Thank god we have the MADE IN USA probes, otherwise a tremendous amount of scientific research would go neglected.
We have the engineering and math, but we also have a) greedy engineers b) greedy mathematicians c) greedy materials developers The more money these three take, the more the funding base has to be increased. With a publicly funded space program such as NASA, it gets extremely hard to ask for tax money. The need to beat the communists in space is gone now, so funding goes down, and mistakes are made. As soon as mistakes start getting made, public faith begins to disappear and it gets much harder to get the funding to fix the problems. Granted, some mistakes, such as the unit discrepancy in parent's links, are better solved by actually watching what you're doing and possibly adopting set standards within an organization than by throwing money at them, but those mistakes make it much harder to get funding to fix the problems that can be solved with cash.
A headphone jack....
REAL penguins build their own kernels and binaries!
It's not the Art Bell Show anymore. He has only recently started back hosting two nights a week. The rest of the time it's hosted by George Noory and it's called Coast-to-Coast AM.
Most of the guests are real flakes, but there are some who are great to listen to - Michio Kaku, e.g.. Check out the website to see who's coming up on the show and pick the good ones to hear. Ignore the flakes.
I hope you were saying that tongue-in-cheek. Hoagland used to be a relatively intelligent man, but over the last twenty years or so, he's gone off the deep end. The only way to prove to him that there is no face on Mars is to send his ass there on the first mission.
Just as long as we all believe in Santa Claus, we'll be okay.
Or maybe Mars is a long way away and it's really hard to build a machine that can be expected to work for months on end whilst being baked and simultaneously frozen after being placed in a vacuum and bombarded with radiation...
Which leads me to think that it's a good thing we're not trying very hard to mount any manned missions to Mars in the near future. If mankind has so much difficulty getting a relatively small, unmanned probe into Martian orbit/onto Martian soil, think about how much harder it would be with a vastly larger craft that needs to keep complex life-support systems in running order the whole time, and then make a safe return trip.
I know there are a lot of Slashdot readers who think we should be all gung-ho about exploring the Solar System, and that we should be willing to accept the much higher risk that goes along with such exploration, but it's starting to look like the odds of such a mission achieving the goals of taking men to Mars and returning them safely to Earth would be pretty slim. I don't think society is prepared to wager billions of dollars not to mention human lives on a venture with a 10% chance of success. Unless we discover that Saddam Hussein and Osama bin Laden are holed up on Mars with a big stockpile of WMD, that is.
1. Orbiters are generally not sanitized to the level that landers are, so there is a higher chance of viable organisms on the Jap probe.
2. I don't know about Japanese orbital policy, but NASA policy requires that probes be launched on an orbit that will cause it to slightly miss it's target.... then when it's almost at the planet the orbital bias is removed so that orbital insertion takes place. So if this were a NASA mission there wouldn't be contaimination if the probe died... it'd just happily whizz on by into a solar orbit.
--Rob
The Japanese are not in space. The Chinese, at least, have put a man there. So, the parent does make sense. Don't agree with it, though.
While I *do* know who Art is, and I will admit to listening occasionally, just for the entertainment value on long night drives, this makes me think of something else entirely.
Larry Niven
Specifically, it makes me think of Ringworld and The Ringworld Throne. I was not all that impressed with the book, but the concept of using magnetics to control a star as a huge gas laser was trippy.
Now, we have all these probes headed towards Mars, and we suddenly get the most active period of solar disturbances in recent history.
Some of these probes have apparently been damaged by the recent extreme solar flares.
If you read the book, the control center for the "sun" lasers was where? On the map of... MARS.
Hmmmm.... *smiles* Just too cool.
There are 4 boxes to use in the defense of liberty: soap, ballot, jury, ammo. Use in that order- Ed Howdershelt Via Tass
Earth is doomed
This issue is a bit more complicated than you think.
'No wonder this circuit failed. It says "Made in Japan"' - Dr. Emmet Brown, 1955.
It's Marvin the Martian blasting our probes because he's still mad at Bugs Bunny.
Here's what the little bugger looks like. Marvin
lol, I get it!
[SIG] Remember Mattel handheld games?
If earthlings never reach Mars before they're extinct (or the Earth is obliterated), will future space travelers (or future Martians) attribute all the Earth junk left on Mars as early Martian artifacts?
What if some artifacts on Earth aren't really from Earth?
*Cue X-Files Theme*
We're putting a lot of junk out into various parts of space. Makes you think...
Or maybe Mars is a long way away and it's really hard to build a machine that can be expected to work for months on end whilst being baked and simultaneously frozen after being placed in a vacuum and bombarded with radiation. Then to put this complicated device on top of hundreds of tonnes of high explosive so that you can get it moving fifteen times faster than a rifle bullet with the objective of placing it somewhere near a body only slightly larger than the Moon?
The alternative is to use ion based propulsion (as on the Beagle 2), but there are still hundreds of other factors to be controlled.
With our current technology the prospect of getting humans to mars and back (in good health) is laughable, the main obstacle being the immense radiation levels which will have to be endured for months each way.
Lead isnt practical as it adds too much weight to the hull. Current sheilding methods on the ISS (which remains within the Van Allen Belts) are mainly polythene based with water storage around sleeping quarters.
"Or maybe Mars is a long way away and it's really hard to build a machine that can be expected to work for months on end whilst being baked and simultaneously frozen after being placed in a vacuum and bombarded with radiation....."
I cut the rest of the comment, since probes have made it to Mars, Jupiter, Saturn, and have even left the solar system.
If we take it as fact that we have at one time overcome the above stated issues, it comes down to one of two things, Martians or decline in quality and work ethic. I can find proof of the decline, I haven't found any proof of little green (wo)men!
Now are the Martians conspiring to dumb down the youth of the world? Let me put on my tinfoil thinking-hat and get back to you!
I live in Japan and have been hearing frequently deceptive information made by japanese organizations. I am starting to believe that, for some reason, the japanese have a real problem with truth and reality.
Recently there have been serious problems with radioactive leakage at nuclear reactors and the japanese companies responsible did initially lie to the public (and the government) about the real situation.
The japanese economy is going through a serious recession and one of the problems is the false statements made from the financial organizations.
Statistics about social trends and problems are dubituous, not to say manipulated. e.g., AIDS statistics.
Discrimination and human rights violations are common, yet the reality is covered by the local news and authorities.
Double standard and unclear laws, even for the japanese themselves, are quite common.
Due to things like these and some others, I have been loosing respect and trust for the japanese, both at a personal and professional level.
Actually Mars is way bigger than the moon, it is slightly smaller than Earth though.
One more reason why Mars is no place to raise a kid. Ooooo, I'm channeling Shatner!)
I thought that was an Elton John lyric...
And it's "Mars ain't the kind of place to raise a kid."
Pedantically yours,
Mal the Elder
... probably has something to say about it...
Contrary to the popular belief, there indeed is no God.
That's why it's called "rocket science". Because this is not easy.
Tech Public Policy stuff
Mars Express is due to enter Martian orbit on Christmas Day and send a British-built Beagle 2 lander to the surface, while the NASA rovers should arrive on Jan. 3 and Jan. 24.
:)
I can see it now. Robot Wars on Mars!
Ignore the conspiracy theory nutjobs blaming aliens for damaging the Japanese probe. There probably is something wrong (as in intentionally untrue) about this story but there is a simpler and more human explanation for it. If JAXA's version of events is correct, this is the third space vehicle they've had die recently because of solar flares. (See http://www.spacedaily.com/2003/031031090646.2kxsn
They lost Midori-2 and Kodama in October, both supposedly due to solar flares. According to a friend who works on the Midori program, they really don't know what went wrong. The power started fading and over the course of several hours, went from about 6Kw of power to 1Kw. If a solar flare killed Midori-2, the power should have dumped quickly. Despite not knowing why it died, they blamed solar flares. My guess is that flares got the blame because that way, it is nobody's fault. Given how unforthcoming JAXA has been about Nozumi, I would not take their explanation of Nozumi's problems at face value unless they also release credible data showing cause and effect.
Now what does THIS mean?
At one time parent post (the one +5 now) was "0, Troll". It would signify some of its informations are purposedly false. So I asked if someone could point out what is false - if anything is, because I would like to know whether I can depend on that info or just someone who shouldn't, became a moderator. And now I still don't know whether that post is true or false, only that some people here definitely feel bad about investigating the truth and are ready to waste their mod points in order to prevent revealing it.
45 5F E1 04 22 CA 29 C4 93 3F 95 05 2B 79 2A B2
Yeah, right. I gave that same excuse to my boss yesterday when he asked why his e-mail wasn't working. Do they really think we're going to believe something that lame?
Mod down posts with a "Free Mac Mini/iPod" sig, they're spam!
Wouldn't there be a regular exchange of any existing genetic information between planets already? There are meteorites from Mars found on earth. They weren't steralized. Do the enclosures and pockets of a lander make a big difference? Is a little bacteria okay, but a lot (or a larger variety of bacteria) dangerous? If bacterial contamination was going to happen, wouldn't it have already done so, at least to a very small degree?
I understand erring on the side of caution, but how likely is it that these saftey measures will really accomplish anything?
___
It's the end of my comment as I know it and I feel fine.
Have a 1992 Toyota corolla with almost 647K miles on it. Here's some reliability data.
alternator(dealer not after market)-- lasts 340K miles. Only reason it goes out is the carbon contacts wear down. The after market ones last 60K miles.
o2 sensor-- last 240K miles whereas american car o2 sensors only last 60K.
water pump -- lasts 230K miles so far. Only replace twice due to seal leaks.
radiator -- once at 540K miles due to just wear-n-tear. Was getting blockage in radiator fins causing air conditioning to shut down when the temp gauge approaches 75% of max(safety feature) only when driving in the desert heat.
batteries-- every 3 years.
Known engineering defects -- the only known engineering design defect with the corolla is the exhaust manifold and down pipes. Have replaced each one 3 times. Exhaust manifolds crack (in the V groove where each cylinder pipe comes together into one pipe) and the inner pipes breaks its weld in the down pipe.(between exhaust and converter).
expect to take it to 1Mil miles in the next 3-4 years. Only 350K more miles to go at 70-80K miles per year.
Also have a 1990 camry with 80K which I don't drive that much since it's the luxury car.
The corrolla is a commuter and the 4x4 car. It's
gone up pikes peak, up Mt Rainer, to Vancouver Canada, thru the canyon lands Utah, Glacier national park, mexico and all over the deserts and mountains of Colorado,AZ, NM, Texas,(paved and dirt roads). As long as there is clearance beneath the vehicle it will be driven there! Was never stranded!!!! Although I've replaced 14 windshields in it due to construction zones on highways vs. back road trips.
However, one has to maintain the car with the usual items that need maintenance: belts, fluids, tires, brakes and tires.
the beagle will probably fail, because once it gets to mars, it'll get a sniff of uranus and run off into inifinity and never be seen again.
It does not need to commit suicide. The Martians are reponsible for all the other losses. They got pissed off with our trade embargos against them, and our descision to end bilateral peace negotiations. Apparently tourists are no longer welcome on Mount Olympus Mons either. Damn reds!! Whe will people see the truth?
Is the probe some sort of genesis torpedo that will turn Mars into a lush rainforest planet on impact? Even if it does contaminate its crash site, or even everything within a few thousand miles of it, it's not likely to interfere with the next 3 probes' search for fossilized bacteria. I understand it's not ideal for good science, but if it happens...big deal.
...the Martian Successor Nadesico probe?
I know I've read about more than just micro/nano-technology for this too, but I can't find it in my bookmarks at the moment. Check out more NASA Institute for Advanced Concepts here.
Karma: NaN
Interesting, but I'm not quite biting yet.
First of all because you say you're living in Japan and yet you post anonymously. (Not that a Slashdot name of "Hiro" is gonna make me think you're really living there or anything; I'm just frequently untrusting of anonymous authors making wild accusations on here.) Secondly, you make accusations but failed to provide any proof, for either the "false" press releases or the "truth" that came out afterwards.
Again, I'm not saying you made all of it up; I'm just asking for some proof from you to back up your claims.
Karma: NaN