Schiaparelli Mars Lander May Have Exploded On Impact, European Agency Says (npr.org)

Instead of drifting gently onto Mars' surface, the Schiaparelli Mars lander hit the planet hard -- and possibly exploded, the European Space Agency said today. NPR adds: The NASA images, taken on Oct. 20, show two recent changes to the landscape on Mars' surface -- one dark blotch, and one white speck -- which are being interpreted as Schiaparelli's parachute and its crash site. With the warning that analysis is still ongoing, here are the details the ESA is sharing Friday: "Estimates are that Schiaparelli dropped from a height of between 2 and 4 kilometers, therefore impacting at a considerable speed, greater than 300 km/h [186 mph]. The relatively large size of the feature would then arise from disturbed surface material. It is also possible that the lander exploded on impact, as its thruster propellant tanks were likely still full." That sequence of events followed the lander's largely trouble-free approach to the Martian surface, a trip that was being widely watched on Wednesday, when the craft lost contact with the ESA and its Mars mothership, the Trace Gas Orbiter, just before its touchdown.

Comments

Uh oh

[Dunbal]

It's going to be hard convincing the Martians that "we come in peace" after this...

Re:Uh oh

[Anonymous Coward]

k'brill and the Council ordered the Earth probe be destroyed because it was attempting to land too near our training facilities. As the temperatures on Mars have fallen over the millennia, our females have become increasingly barren. But the temperatures on Earth have been rising during this time period. Because of this, over the past 100 years we have taken females from Earth or our species would perish. We did not like this, but thought it was our only option.

We later tried becoming a part of the Earth population and using intellect and kindness to mate with the Earth women, but that has not produced enough offspring to save our species. Over the last 10 years we have learned that Earth women are most eager to mate with males that play the guitar, sing into a microphone, ride a motorcycle, or move a ball on a playing field. Our Earth Trainees now learn these skills at this facility and are then sent to Earth to mate. The Earth women eagerly open their legs when meeting someone with these skills. Also, their is no expectation that this type of male remain with the female, so he is free to impregnate many other women. And their governments will pay all expenses for raising these children.

It remains to be seen what will happen when these half ape and half reptilian children meet and reproduce and if they will have any special abilities. One of our species has entered the USA presidential contest in an attempt to gain power that will allow more of us to colonize Earth.

1.3 billion euro whoops

[Moheeheeko]

"I did the calculations in feet....but I programmed the lander in meters..."

Protecting Mars

[waveclaw]

The space departments clean these landers quite well. But exploding on impact was either effective at sterilizing the craft in a final way or spread the contamination over the maximal area.

In both cases Mars maintains a reputation as the place that robots go to die.

Thankfully NASA took the pictures

[chispito]

Thankfully NASA took the pictures, so the ESA can't sit on them for a few days/weeks before suggesting the all-but-inevitable (the lander crashed). The ESA really needs to learn to be more open with their operations.

Late-Breaking News from the Council [REPOST]

[psergiu]

https://science.slashdot.org/c...

LATE-BREAKING NEWS FROM THE COUNCIL: VICTORY! The Council of Elders has confirmed the blueworlders' resumption of aggression upon our noble red sands. K'Breel, Speaker for the Council of Elders, addressed the planet thusly: OKAY. Okay, so I'm K'Breel (even though anyone on Slashdot can assume the mantle merely by declaring themselves Speaker for the Council), and I'm late, but I'm merely chronologically late, not as in the Late Second Adjunctant to the Council Formerly Known As G'Ranee.

But domestic politics is beneath us tonight -- just take a glance at the blue world beneath us for a look at how bad that can get -- and let us focus on what's important: over the past sol or so, our Planetary Defense Force has been so good at pre-emptively distracting the blueworlders with tasks like landing comets, grabbing their prospective mates by their genitals, low-planetary orbit missions, and just general tribal infighting that we haven't had to shoot down any robotic invaders in quite some time. But when the opportunity presents itself, we take advantage of it, and so, we did. Hence the trivial elimination of yet another putative invader from elsewhere. We'd do it every day, except that the blueworlders lack the gelsacular fortitude to send us more targets. Now as to gelsacular fortitude, on to Second Adjunctant G'Ranee...

When a junior reporter pointed out that the destroyed invader was merely a technology demonstrator built on the cheap to see if a landing was possible, and that the blueworlders' actual payload was safely in orbit, K'Breel had the reporter's gelsacs launched into orbit alongside those of G'Ranee for a closer look.

Last heard transmission:

[Chris Mattern]

"This is the captain. We have a little problem with our entry sequence, so we may experience some slight turbulence and then explode"
"We're gonna explode!? I don't wanna explode!"

Re:Im not trying to be that guy..

[caffeinated_bunsen]

When the propellants are two reactive liquids that ignite on contact with each other, a kaboom is a perfectly reasonable consequence of a sudden, severe rearrangement of the tankage.

Re:Incredible opportunity

[The Grim Reefer]

NASA contacted Matt Damon for help with this yesterday. They're plan is to "science the shit out of it."

Mars is difficult

[The Grim Reefer]

It's not easy to have a successful mission to Mars. Of the 44 missions to Mars 18 have been successful, 23 failures and 3 made Mars orbit but the landers were not successful. Currently India is the only country to have a successful mission to Mars on the first try. This is the second time the ESA successfully got into orbit but lost the lander.

Re:So?

[amicusNYCL]

It wasn't on wheels, it was on a "crushable structure" designed to cushion the landing. It was a stationary lander, not a rover. Preliminary indications are that the structure did actually crush, and that it is in fact stationary.

Two large chunks escaped

[MichaelSmith]

If the parachute is behind the lander (in the direction of travel) then the two smaller dark spots above the large dark spot are where chunks of the lander would bounce after impact. The chunks are in the 12 and 2 o'clock positions. Also the parachute is more than 1km from the impact site, which seems a lot given the altitude of separation. But it makes sense if the lander retained its horizontal velocity at separation, while the parachute braked in the atmosphere.

Re:There is still a way to get science out of this

[Gavagai80]

Well, you've lost all your internet points. Hopefully that teaches you to stop making things up without googling. The landing area is the same as Opportunity's landing area, and Opportunity even attempted to image the landing: http://www.planetary.org/blogs...