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Marooned Off Vesta

Posted by Soulskill on from the pebble-in-a-dark-sea dept.

mcgrew writes with this quote from an AP report: "After four years sailing through space, the Dawn spacecraft was expected to slip into orbit late Friday around a giant asteroid to begin a yearlong investigation into the origins of the solar system. It is the first of two scheduled tour stops for the NASA probe that almost never made it to the launch pad. Because of its stunted growth, Vesta holds 'a record of the earliest history of the solar system,' said the mission's lead scientist Christopher Russell of the University of California, Los Angeles." Dawn's mission homepage has all the information and pictures collected so far. On July 9th, it snapped our best look to date at the ~530-kilometer-wide Vesta, from 40,000 kilometers away. When it arrives, it will take observations from successively lower orbits, the final one being only 460km above Vesta's surface. Next May, Dawn will break orbit and head to Ceres. (mcgrew adds, "The submission's title is a nod to Isaac Asimov. Lets hope Dawn doesn't get marooned!")

5 of 55 comments (clear)

  1. Re:Wow by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1, Informative

    Click on that dudes link if you want to be both trolled and disgusted.

  2. Framing Camera Runs RTEMS by joelsherrill · · Score: 4, Informative

    The pictures that are being shown like this one (http://dawn.jpl.nasa.gov/multimedia/dawn_vesta_image_070911.asp) are from the Framing Camera. It is using the free RTOS RTEMS (http://www.rtems.org) and using a space hardened SPARC V7. It was launched in September 2007. Congratulations to all the people involved!!

  3. Isaac Isamov did it first by RCC42 · · Score: 3, Informative

    Just in case anyone wanted to know 'Marooned off Vesta' was the title of Isaac Isamov's first published (short) story. As I remember it was fairly good.

  4. Re:In standard distance units. by camperdave · · Score: 3, Informative

    Nice try. Miles are defined in terms of metres, making metres the standard distance unit.

    --
    When our name is on the back of your car, we're behind you all the way!
  5. Asimov Homage Story Link by cosm · · Score: 3, Informative

    Karma Whoring: http://www.polvoestelar.com.mx/babilonia/Libros/Isaac%20Asimov/English/Short%20Stories/Isaac%20Asimov%20-%20The%20Best%20of%20Isaac%20Asimov.pdf

    First story in the PDF. I'd never read it until today--great stuff.

    --
    'We are trying to prove ourselves wrong as quickly as possible, because only in that way can we find progress.' RPF