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Mars Probe Brings the "Weather Rock" New Respect

Posted by timothy on from the if-tail-is-wet dept.

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."

3 of 144 comments (clear)

  1. It's called a 'wind sock' by Chris+Burke · · Score: 4, Informative

    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.

    --

    The enemies of Democracy are
  2. Re:Don't you hate it when... by blueg3 · · Score: 4, Informative

    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.

  3. Dowsing rods don't detect anything by CustomDesigned · · Score: 4, Informative

    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.