Rovers May Survive Martian Winter 266
yokem_55 writes "According to this article on Yahoo News, Mars rover engineers are beginning to consider the possibility that the rovers may be able to survive the oncoming Martian winter in a hibernation mode, and then return to activity when spring returns to the red planet. The article ends with a quote from Steve Squires speculating that, 'we're looking at the final demise of these vehicles perhaps as late as the onset of our second winter on Mars.'"
It is utterly inhumane (Score:5, Funny)
Dude! it is a robot!
Re:Problems? (Score:3, Funny)
They're NASA, you're just some chump behind a computer.
Parking Up (Score:3, Funny)
The sweetest sight. (Score:4, Funny)
Rover>ping -t mars_rover
Pinging mars_rover with 32 bytes of data:
Request timed out.
Request timed out.
Request timed out.
Request timed out.
Request timed out.
Request timed out.
Reply from 192.168.1.2: bytes=32 time=2ms TTL=64
Reply from 192.168.1.2: bytes=32 time=1ms TTL=64
Reply from 192.168.1.2: bytes=32 time=6ms TTL=64
Reply from 192.168.1.2: bytes=32 time=6ms TTL=64
Ping statistics for 192.168.1.2:
Packets: Sent = 9, Received = 4, Lost = 5 (55% loss),
Approximate round trip times in milli-seconds:
Minimum = 1ms, Maximum = 6ms, Average = 3ms
Winter driving (Score:1, Funny)
You know it doesn't sound half as funny as it did 20 years ago, stuck in an overladen Volvo estate halfway up a French mountain with night closing in.
Lucky Nasa boys (Score:2, Funny)
Damn *%$!%& Santa never brought one.....sob...
Re:The sweetest sight. (Score:4, Funny)
The next Martian Rovers (Score:5, Funny)
Re:The sweetest sight. (Score:1, Funny)
Then i realised that it was just an over-exictable geek with too much time on their hands and no evident form of life.
Hey tell Nasa (Score:4, Funny)
Duh!!
You would think they would have seen "Total Recall" already, what have they been doing?
Possible Martian intervention? (Score:5, Funny)
Oh like no one saw this coming.... (Score:5, Funny)
good for them (Score:4, Funny)
Re:Is it just me... (Score:5, Funny)
Re:The sweetest sight. (Score:1, Funny)
3ms is probably too slow then.
Insurance (Score:2, Funny)
.
Re:Problems? (Score:5, Funny)
They asked him what type of car it was, he said it was a kit car. "How much did the kit cost?" they asked. "Oh, about 450 million dollars." replied the caller.
Yes, an engineer from JPL was calling to get some tongue-in-cheek advice on what to do to keep the rovers safe over the martian winter.
It was pretty cool.
Re:The sweetest sight. (Score:2, Funny)
Re:It is utterly inhumane (Score:3, Funny)
Re:The important question... (Score:2, Funny)
Winter, not-so-winter, spring, not-so-spring, summer, not-so-summer, autumn, damn-cold-here-time.
Re:Is it just me... (Score:5, Funny)
"Oh no! The mission is in jeopardy! Hundreds of millions of taxpayer dollars wasted!"
"But there is some good news, sir."
"Really? What?"
"We saved a bunch of money on the insurance by switching to Geico!"
=Smidge=
cannibals... (Score:1, Funny)
A real sysadmin (Score:4, Funny)
Mod parent down for being MADE UP (Score:3, Funny)
Furthermore, your oh so cunning plan argument falls even FURTHER apart when you take into account that these sorts of policies are for launches, which are the points at which they are most likely to fail. If the launch goes off well then the insurance policy is over, regardless of whether or not they advertise their mission as being 1 month, or 1 year.
Also, they could always just insure it for 1 month, IF you were right anyways, which you're not.
Finally, the insurance policies are for businesses who want to make a profit and must exhibit some measure of prudence.
If you really want to be such an ass to that other person who responded to you, you should at least be able to back up some of the mindless, pointy-haired boss bullshit that you want to spout out. Saying things like I'm smart don't go very far anywhere, particularly when followed by idiotic statements that you can't back up.
Re:Is it just me... (Score:3, Funny)