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Mars Probe May Have Spotted Sojourner Rover
Maggie McKee writes "NASA's eagle-eyed Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter may have spotted the tiny, toaster oven-sized Sojourner rover just a few meters away from its companion, the Mars Pathfinder lander. It appears to have crawled there in an attempt to re-establish contact with the lander after the lander had already died.
But the pictures aren't clear enough to definitively ID the rover, and it's possible Sojourner simply took off on its own. If it were miraculously still alive after 10 years, it could be 3 kilometers away from Pathfinder — and probably impossible to find, even with MRO."
There is a collection of much higher resolution pictures on the NASA site to the point you can see the ramps on the lander.
It is difficult to see whether the sojurner rover is nearby or not. The programming was set to make it do so but I like the thought of an intrepid little robot setting off on it's own.
"It's a magical world, Hobbes old buddy. Let's go exploring"
If you don't want to repeat the past, stop living in it.
This high-res version of the image has pointers to the objects of interest - I still can't figure out which pixel is supposed to be the rover though.
MRO has only been on station a few months, since March. Imaging these four American landers were probably higher priorities than older Soviet landers.
I believe the appearent bias is for technical reasons, such as newer radio tracking technology, and the fact that surface images are used to help find the landing sites. No Soviet probe ever returned a surface image.
Somebody discovered that if they stretch the vertical scale of a Viking surface image, the distant hills were more easy to see. This allowed them to match them to orbiter photos of the general vacinity.
The Sojourner landing set found two fairly large hills in the distance that were used to pinpoint their spot.
The two current rovers also sent back images from about a mile high just before landing for the very purpose of finding them from orbit. (Technically the camera was on the outer appuratus, not the rovers themselves.)
This is partly in response to the lost Polar Lander, which they are still looking for to gain clues to what went wrong. The fact that Polar Lander didn't send radio signals nor images is why it is still lost. Thus, Polar Lander is in the same boat as the Soviet landers and Beagle.
It is not nationalism bias, at least not yet.
Table-ized A.I.
You're confusing dates and events, but essentially yes. Viking 2 failed in 1980 after 3 1/2 years due to battery failure. Viking 1 survived for over six years until 1982. It didn't actually die on its own, we broke it. An update to the battery charging software overwrote the antenna positioning software and contact was lost.
The article links to a downsized picture. If you really want in on the fun, download the 6.2 MB full size image from the MRO website.
The Pathfinder lander itself is labeled MPF. It's about 2/3 of the way across the image (to the right) and perhaps 500 pixels from the top. It appears lighter than the surrounding material, roughly triangular in shape, and has a slight shadow to the right.
I'm not sure which point they think is the adorable little Sojourner (pic of mockup next to Spirit and Odyssey on earth), but I think it's the two light grey pixels with a shadow about 15-20 pixels north of Pathfinder. That may just be one of the rocks it studied, though.
The parachute and backshell are also labeled. The round object is the aerodynamic backshell that covered the top of the lander during entry. It is attached to the parachute, which is draped over the ground a few meters northeast.
The think the heatshield fragments are pretty self-explanatory, although I'm unsure why it's so scattered. It must have broken up, probably tumbling, shortly after being released.
The distribution of parts around the landscape makes some sense if you know how it landed. Pathfinder entered the Martian atmosphere at about 17,000 mph. It aerobraked using the heatshield down to about 900 mph. After two minutes, the parachute deployed and the heat shield was released. The lander was then lowered on a tether so it would be clear of the backshell. 8 seconds before touchdown, the airbags inflated and retrorockets fired. 2 seconds before touchdown, the tether was cut, with the retrorockets carrying the backshell safely away from the lander, and the Pathfinder bounced down onto its airbags.
I think the Pathfinder payed for itself just in coolness (come on...airbags! Who thinks this stuff up?). Add science and engineering lessons learned, and this mission is priceless.
The pathfinder rover is 63cm long. How many toasters are 63cm long? Come on Slashdot. If you're going to make a comparison, at least ensure it is apt.
MPL isn't flying through space - it did crash, and they did try to image it. http://www.space.com/missionlaunches/050601_mpl_cl ues.html
I guess it's this one: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yjiGH9QNiU0
Definitely worth finding.
They wouldn't see anything. Hubble can just barely make out Pluto's newly discovered 2nd and 3rd moons, and the Voyagers are a hell of a lot smaller and much much further away.