Mars Phoenix Probe Successfully Launched

necro81 writes "The Mars Phoenix lander, built from the ashes of two earlier Mars missions, successfully launched atop a Delta II rocket from Canaveral this morning. The mission takes the 350-kg lander to northern latitudes (comparable to Greenland or Siberia) to investigate subsurface ice for the chemical precursors of life. The lander should arrive on Mars on May 25, 2008. 'NASA has never attempted to land a spacecraft on Mars at such a high northern latitude. A lander intended for the red planet's South Pole went silent immediately upon arrival in 1999. That failure, combined with the loss of the companion Mars orbiter, prompted NASA to cancel a 2001 lander mission. The parts from that scrapped mission were used for Phoenix, thus its name, which alludes to the mythological bird that rises from its own ashes.'"

Because The Government Is Immune To All Laws

[Anonymous Coward]

See current united states administration as example.

Google: define allude

[Matt Edd]

http://www.thefreedictionary.com/allude [thefreedictionary.com]

allude (-ld)
intr.v. alluded, alluding, alludes
To make an indirect reference: The candidate alluded to the recent war by saying, "We've all made sacrifices."
[Latin alldere, to play with : ad-, ad- + ldere, to play (from ldus, game; see leid- in Indo-European roots).]
Usage Note: Allude and allusion are often used where the more general terms refer and reference would be preferable. Allude and allusion normally apply to indirect references in which the source is not spec

Canadian Content

[zapwow]

Included on the lander is a Canadian-built weather station.
http://www.cbc.ca/technology/story/2007/08/04/mars -lander.html [www.cbc.ca]

Re:

[mikeabbott420]

Celsenheit

Comment removed

[account_deleted]

Comment removed based on user account deletion

Re:

[zapwow]

Are you Tom Duck from Dalhousie? I've heard of you, I am in the space program at York.

Re:

[account_deleted]

Comment removed based on user account deletion

Re:

[Tablizer]

Included on the lander is a Canadian-built weather station.

Martain Skeptic: "I told you it was just a weather balloon!"
     

Re:

[Have Brain Will Rent]

Ha Ha Ha, the Canadian need to insert their minor contributions into world events is hilarious.

Shhhhhh! You're embarrassing your country (not to mention yourself)!

North Pole?

[ivanwillsau]

Does any one know if on Mars the North Pole actually the south seeking pole (as on earth) or is it a real north seeking pole like we are used to in bar magnets etc?

Re:

[josquint]

Its seems that a directional magnetic field may be immaterial [64.233.169.104]

Re:North Pole?

[Ironsides]

The Marssian North Pole is in reference to the geographical north pole, not the magnetic. The Marssian magnetic field is so week as to be non existent.

Comment removed

[account_deleted]

Comment removed based on user account deletion

Re:

[account_deleted]

Comment removed based on user account deletion

Re:

[ivanwillsau]

If Mars has no magnetic field what determines North?

Re:

[Anonymous Coward]

The rotation of the planet and the right-hand rule.

Re:

[icebrain]

The axis of rotation. The magnetic poles on earth wander--I think the north one is currently somewhere in Canada. But the geographic poles of any body are the points where the axis of rotation penetrate the surface.

Re:

[MobileTatsu-NJG]

"One of the theories is that the solar wind of particles from the sun carried away the atmosphere, and so the oceans just evaporated away until it became so cold the remaining water froze into the polar ice caps. Recent estimates indicate that Mars loses some 100 tons of atmosphere every day. The Earth is protected from the solar wind by its magnetosphere, which results from the magnetic field."

Hmmm... I have a question: Let's say that theory is correct. Would it be possible to pick a decent sized crate

Re:

[account_deleted]

Comment removed based on user account deletion

Re:

[roman_mir]

One of the Potentials of Geothermal Power [slashdot.org] is that we lose our atmosphere on this planet to solar winds as well.

Re:Great. Just great.

[YrWrstNtmr]

Think how many people could have been fed with this money.

$420 million. Enough to buy every person in the US 1 apple. Just one.
Think how many people have been fed with this money. The operative word you're looking for is jobs. Go get one. You might like it.

The poverty gene

[flyingfsck]

Explains it all: http://scotlandonsunday.scotsman.com/scotland.cfm? id=753652006 [scotsman.com]

Re:

[drsquare]

You pay $1.40 for an apple?

Re:

[Jugalator]

What I find most stupid about those fucking stupid "NASA money could have been spent better" comments is that NASA has a comparatively miniscule share of the US budget. Now look at the war against a phantom/abstract threat and THAT budget and we're talking about saving lives if spent better. And probably making less enemies too.

Re:

[dsands1]

Wow! Your post probably resulted in cardiac arrest somewhere on the planet! I'm sitting here giggling like a catholic school girl!

Re:Great. Just great.

[Ihlosi]

Think how many people could have been fed with this money.

Dangit, do you have to be so pessmistic ?

Think about how many guns and bombs and other things that actively make peoples lifes miserable will not be bought with this money.

There, you can start cheering now. I'm all for space exploration because it takes money that would otherwise most likely be used for killing people.

Re:

[stevesliva]

Think how many people could have been fed with this money.

Or we could replace just one bridge over the Mississippi River... quite frankly I'm glad they're spending it on Mars, but I'm not commuting to work in Minneapolis. I think space missions are getting cheaper relative to bridges, too.

Re:

[flyingfsck]

The poor will always be with us. If you feed them now, more of them will die worse later... In short no good has ever resulted from wasting resources on feeding the poor. Finding them jobs is a much better idea.

The missing Mars Polar Lander...

[kryten_nl]

Here's what happened to the missing Mars Polar Lander: http://youtube.com/watch?v=x_iPvUWyzhE [youtube.com]

- Heineken fanboi

Re:

[Buran]

That's an MER spoof. Doesn't even look close to what the MPL looked like.

Unwelcome visitors!

[kiberovca]

Puny humans! This one will go silent too! Not only you don't ask for permission to visit, but you also pollute our water supply with useless noisy junk!

This time, not even Tom Cruise will save you!

Re:

[Dusty101]

K'Breel? Is that you?

Could you imagine...

[thatskinnyguy]

It would be really cool if it found a frozen mammoth like this one [wikipedia.org]. Of course it also has an equal chance at drilling-through to the inner sanctuary of the Q Continuum [memory-alpha.org] while there on Mars.

Re:

[BiggerIsBetter]

It would be really cool if it found a frozen mammoth like this one.

It wouldn't be too cool if we found a frozen alien mammoth like this [imdb.com] one!

Phoenix

[dsanfte]

Thank you for explaining what a Phoenix is. I had always assumed it was the name of a web browser.

CBS coverage

[Anonymous McCartneyf]

http://www.cbsnews.com/stories/2007/08/04/tech/pri ntable3133675.shtml [cbsnews.com]
Seriously, if you are going to link to an Associated Press article, please link to a version that doesn't require registration to read.

Video of the launch

[Anonymous Coward]

There's already a video of the launch on youtube!

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Q0X1FoyLRGY [youtube.com]

Good stuff. Someday I have to see a launch in person, it's got to be impressive

Disappointed

[Gertlex]

The first time my eyes skimmed this, I thought I read that it had landed. Bummer. Biggest trial is still yet to come, imo.

NASA Phoenix interview

[Iddo Genuth]

We have just published yesterday our comprehensive article/interview with NASA on the Phoenix - you can find it here: Phoenix interview [tfot.info]

Deja vu all over again

[Deadstick]

The parts from that scrapped mission were used for Phoenix, thus its name, which alludes to the mythological bird that rises from its own ashes.'"

Likewise the AIM-54 Phoenix air-to-air missile, built on the technology developed for the AIM-47 which never went operational because the two aircraft it was designed for didn't either.

rj

Re:

[Buran]

Of course, then there's the phoenix in the Harry Potter series, named Fawkes ... ... after the guy who tried to blow up Parliament.

Not a very good omen, I think!

Why don't they send some probe to look for life?

[Anonymous Coward]

It seems like all the probes they send up are specifically not looking for life. NASA always says, "oh, we're looking for geological data and evidence of water, but not life", or now, "we're looking for organic compounds, and we're sending up a microscope, but we're really not looking for life".

What's funny is the original Viking mission had a simple test for life. It produced a result that is controversial to this day. Surely in the 30 years since then, they could come up with version 2.0 of some life t

Re:

[account_deleted]

Comment removed based on user account deletion

Re:

[account_deleted]

Comment removed based on user account deletion

Re:Why don't they send some probe to look for life

[Tablizer]

The problem is that detecting life remotely has proven a difficult task. It is hard to rule out soil chemistry, and we don't know enough about potential Martian microbes to target their signs. Even if there was life, tests may create the same kind of controversies that Viking did. Only microscopic views of life wiggling around would be definitative evidence, but that would be an expensive mission, especially if microbes are small and sparse. (The left-right test has promise, but even that is not definative.

Re:

[SAABMaven]

For the cost of the last 'emergency' appropriation to rebuild Iraq's infrastracture, we could have sent people to Mars. The returns on this venture would have made it far more cost effective than continuing to send unmanned probes to a close-by planet which we had the technology to go visit, in person, by about 1973.

Re:Why don't they send some probe to look for life

[Anonymous McCartneyf]

It has been discovered that there are microbes on earth that can survive in space.
It is possible that some of those microbes have been sent into space before we knew they could survive there. We've sent things to Mars for decades.
So, it is possible that there is life on Mars, but we put it there.

Re:

[account_deleted]

Comment removed based on user account deletion

It is not the launch that is the problem...

[flyingfsck]

With Mars, it seems that the arrival is a far more delicate maneuver, so we'll see what happens when it eventually gets there. Will this be another bull's eye? Splattttt!!! or a more dignified descent followed by the sounds of silence? or maybe, just maybe, it's going to work this time? More news in 9 months...

Comment removed

[account_deleted]

Comment removed based on user account deletion

Misnamed

[Arthur Grumbine]

Too bad the original Polar Lander wasn't a "Phoenix".

This is what worries me...

[markana]

"A glass CD loaded with literary, visual and audio science fiction works about the red planet was strapped to NASA's Phoenix Mars Lander, the Planetary Society in Pasadena, Calif. said Friday."
:
"Inlcluded in the works are H.G. Wells' "War of the Worlds,"..." http://www.space.com/news/070804_phoenix_spacelibr ary.html [space.com]

Now THAT'S just going to give the Martian ideas... and they'll probably get their vaccinations before invading this time. Bad enough that we put road maps to Earth on Pioneer an

Re:

[Marcos Eliziario]

Don't worry. The CD is DRM "Enhanced" as per mandated by the MAFIAA.

Re:

[iron-kurton]

This CD also contains names of people who signed up their site to have it shipped on the CD. I signed up my wife's name for Christmas, and every few months or so, we get an update. It's a gift that keeps on giving!

Here's to a safe landing. Go little probe, go!

FYI

[kcurtis]

100 Feet = 30.48 Meters. Just in case you were wondering.

The name is a double entendre

[jtatum]

The summary mentions that the name is derived from the mythical phoenix, but this is only part of the story. The probe - the first to be launched as part of NASA's low cost "scout" program - was led by the University of Arizona. It's safe to guess that Phoenix also refers to the capital of the arid state. I wonder if I'm the only one who keeps confusing the leadership of this mission with the ubiquitous University of Phoenix.

For this and more information on the Phoenix mission, see the mission page [arizona.edu].

Kilograms? Did someone say "Kilograms?"...

[makuabob]

Listen in as we eavesdrop on Phoenix Mission Control:

Scientist - "Kilograms? Oh, shit! How many pounds in a kilogram,... How many pounds in a kilogram? Uh,.. uh,... Let's see! Gotta think quick! Twenty pence in a shilling, 14 shillings in a pound,... We ARE using English pounds, right?!"

Manager - "Settle down now! We've got more than 300 days before landing on Mars."

Scientist - "Three hundred days?! Oh, shit! Are those English days or metric days,... English days or metric days?!"

Bye, bye, Phoenix!