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ESA Begins Mars Rover Tests In Chile

Posted by Soulskill on from the will-they-find-water?! dept.

Zothecula writes "The Atacama desert in Chile is so dry that parts of it are utterly devoid of life down to bacteria. That and its sandy, rock-strewn terrain makes it so similar to Mars that it's a perfect spot for ESA to trial its Sample Acquisition Field Experiment with a Rover (SAFER), which this week is carrying out tests related to navigation, remote control and the use of scientific instruments. The agency's goal is the latest in a series of tests to develop technologies and gain practical experience in anticipation of ESA's launch of the ExoMars rover to the Red Planet in 2018."

8 of 45 comments (clear)

  1. Re:Spotted by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 2, Funny

    Soon we will discover if there is indeed water on Chile

  2. Why not just do it indoors? by Russ1642 · · Score: 2

    The Atacama is pretty inhospitable, especially for people trying to run these tests. They could recreate the conditions in a large indoor lab easily enough. All you need is rocks, sand, fans, and some dehumidifiers. I don't really get why they need to go to the Atacama.

    1. Re:Why not just do it indoors? by iggymanz · · Score: 2

      the terrain of indoor simulation would be small in extents and totally predictable. the 600 square miles of the Atacama doesn't have either problem

    2. Re:Why not just do it indoors? by iggymanz · · Score: 4, Informative

      heh, it's 600 miles long actually, 41,000 square miles.

      but you could drop them off in one place to test in sandy soil, another for small pebbles, another for large rocks, small hills, large hills, etc.

      much more than you can do in a room

    3. Re:Why not just do it indoors? by cusco · · Score: 4, Insightful

      Fill a building in California with sand and it's rapidly going to be full of microorganisms, even if you bake the dirt first. They fed dirt from the Atacama to the Viking lander that was kept on Earth, and it didn't find life.

      Fill a building with rocks and sand and it's all fluffy and aerated. Ground textures are nothing like real-world terrain. Hills can only be a few meters tall and steep slopes are very difficult to build without additives.

      That's just off the top of my head, I'm sure there are more reasons.

      --
      "Think about how stupid the average person is. Now, realise that half of them are dumber than that." - George Carlin
  3. Pfft by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 2, Funny

    Our rover's bigger.

    1. Re:Pfft by Sarten-X · · Score: 2

      Kerbal Space Program has taught me one thing well: Big rovers are ridiculously hard to put anywhere other than "just left of the launchpad".

      Advice for other KSP players: A 650-ton rover is not a good idea. Funny, perhaps, but not good.

      --
      You do not have a moral or legal right to do absolutely anything you want.
  4. Re:Spotted by Incadenza · · Score: 3, Informative

    I know you are joking, but there is plenty of water in the Atacama: rivers that originate in the Andes. They either flow out in the sea (through canyons), in salt pans, or sometimes through a tube to the coastal towns.