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NASA Rover 'Curiosity' Set For Saturday Launch

Posted by Soulskill on from the wave-at-phobos-grunt-on-the-way-up dept.

arcite writes "The Mars Science Laboratory Rover 'Curiosity,' an SUV-sized rover packed to the gills with the latest scientific instruments and an innovative landing system, is set to launch tomorrow. As the heaviest and largest Mars rover to date, if it is successful in touching down on the red planet, it will be the best bet yet for NASA to find signs of life. Stuffed with turkey and burned out on holiday shopping, Geeks everywhere will be watching the skies above (or the livestream here) and wishing NASA's Curiosity godspeed!"

6 of 64 comments (clear)

  1. The Landing by bjb_admin · · Score: 4, Interesting

    Wow the landing video shows how complicated this one is.

    The whole hanging by a crane held up by a thruster module seems quite scary. Especially considering it couldn't be tested at Earth.

    Guess there will be lots of nail biting when the landing comes! Hopefully there is live telemetry for the landing.

  2. Is this thing on? by crumpty · · Score: 4, Interesting
    I have looked around and cannot find the answer as to whether Curiosity has a microphone on board.

    If not then why not?

    Sorry, just a pet peeve of mine, - who wouldn't want to hear the winds of Mars?

    Cheers...

    1. Re:Is this thing on? by geckipede · · Score: 4, Insightful

      Atmospheric pressure at surface level on Mars is about 1% of Earth's pressure at surface. There's not much to hear. It's not going to be totally silent, but sound will be extremely quiet and distorted.

  3. Holy hell, they built a MALP! by Tastecicles · · Score: 5, Interesting

    Have you heard about the instrument package??

    two HD cameras
    mass spectrometers
    chemical laser
    x-ray diffractometer
    full terrestrial weather station
    radiation meter
    magnetometer
    rock abrasion tool
    thermal emission spectrometer
    Moessbauer gamma spectrometer
    panoramic multispectral camera
    microscopic imager

    They could send one of these to Titan to discover once and for all if that moon could ever be settled...

    --
    Operation Guillotine is in effect.
    1. Re:Holy hell, they built a MALP! by 0123456 · · Score: 4, Funny

      Have you heard about the instrument package??

      A fella could have a pretty good weekend in Vegas with all that stuff...

  4. Re:Backups by gblackwo · · Score: 5, Informative

    They did in fact build two of them simultaneously, however the 2nd rover was built for testing and is not sterile enough to send to Mars without a serious teardown. There may be further reasons why the 2nd rover is unsuitable to go.