Mars Probe Brings the "Weather Rock" New Respect

radioweather writes "What looked to casual observers like a malfunction, a dangling wire with something on the end, seen in the first photo of the meteorological mast on NASA's Phoenix Mars Lander, actually turned out to be the real instrument. Surprisingly, it is much like the novelty 'weather rock' seen as a novelty gag around the world. The instrument called the 'Telltale' is described as a 'passive wind indicator' and uses an extremely lightweight Kapton tube hanging in Kevlar fiber. Images taken of the instrument will show the deflection of the Telltale due to the Martian wind."

Comments

Re:Is there life on mars....

[Ellis D. Tripp]

I believe that was Bob Dylan...

It's called a 'wind sock'

[Chris Burke]

And they already had enough respect as a simple form of wind indicator. You may have seen one at an airport, for example. It's not a weather rock.

See, the point, or "joke" as it were, of the weather rock is that it can't actually tell you anything you wouldn't have already known due to your own senses. "If it's wet it's raining, white it's snowing, bouncing and there's an earthquake." But you could tell all those things without the rock... get it?

A wind sock isn't very sophisticated, but it tells us things that wouldn't have been as apparent without it.

Re:It's called a 'wind sock'

[jrumney]

They're calling it a telltale, which from the description sounds more accurate than windsock, as a telltale is not hollow. Telltales (usually thin strips of nylon, sometimes on smaller yachts just bits of string) are used on the leading and trailing edges of sails to indicate the flow of air over and off the sail.

Telltale's

[penguinstorm]

Telltales have long been used in sailing. Most sails have some visible.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tell-tale

That they are incredibly rudimentary and primitive does not diminish their usefullness, provided they're used for what they're meant for. They're not going to predict anything, for example.

Re:Telltale's

[Scratch-O-Matic]

In case anyone is interested, a telltale in sailing is used to properly shape the sail for smooth airflow over the airfoil created by the sail, rather than for determining the direction or strength of the wind.

Re:Don't you hate it when...

[blueg3]

Your $1 version would undoubtedly not survive the trip to and landing on Mars and be counted on to work without further human intervention.

Believe it or not, building devices to be transported to and function on other planets does take a fair bit of work.

Dowsing rods don't detect anything

[CustomDesigned]

A dowsing rod doesn't actually detect anything (even according to practitioners) - it is simply a device to magnify subconscious body language of the operator. The theory is that the human operator detects water via poorly understood senses below conscious awareness. Some dowsers don't bother with the rods, claiming to have trained themselves to become more aware of these senses.

I know I "see" something like a flash of light whenever someone turns on a fluorescent light with magnetic ballast in another room - so I don't think the idea of additional senses is completely crazy.

Re:Somebody explain to me how this is an "experime

[Scratch-O-Matic]

Are you kidding?

On the off chance you are not: the telltale is but one tiny instrument among many others that are much more sophisticated. A freebie, if you will. The vehicle is a very complex, self-contained geological lab, including:


+ Robotic Arm
+ Robotic Arm Camera
+ Mars Descent Imager
+ Meteorological Station
+ Surface Stereo Imager
+ Microscopy, Electrochemistry, and Conductivity Analyzer

Re:Somebody explain to me how this is an "experime

[trongey]

This is a great experiment. Please re-read the paper you linked. The telltale was selected as a budget-friendly alternative to other wind measurement instruments. It's a very simple and reliable tool that can provide valuable data. It also does the job without using the lander's valuable battery power.

Recording wind direction and relative speed allows for some basic meteorology. With some calibration it can even provide absolute wind speed. It also can be used to determine local wind conditions before deploying other experiments that might be affected by high winds in a particular direction.

You want the government to deliver results? It did.

PS: Your windsocks, while maybe not of practical use to most third graders, are still used at airports around the world to provide critical wind data to pilots.