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Space Mars

Mars Rover, Spirit, Turns 4 149

Posted by ScuttleMonkey from the bouncing-happily-among-the-rocks dept.
Brandee07 writes "Designed for a 90 day mission, the Spirit Mars Rover is starting its 4th year of exploration. Spirit's sister-module, Opportunity, will turn four on Jan 25. 'We never thought we'd still be driving these robots all over Mars,' said Mark Lemmon, a planetary scientist at Texas A&M University and member of the rover science team. 'We joked about driving Opportunity into Victoria Crater, but now we're there, and we're looking at doing even more science. Each day they still work is an amazing one.'"
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Mars Rover, Spirit, Turns 4 More

Mars Rover, Spirit, Turns 4

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  • May you have many more!

  • Happy Birthday! (Score:5, Insightful)

    by Iphtashu Fitz ( 263795 ) on Friday January 04, 2008 @03:52PM (#21914362)
    And here's to hoping for another 4 years of trundling along the Martian surface!

    It absolutely amazes me how engineers are able to build machines like the Rovers, the Voyager spacecraft, etc. so that they last as long as they do in these incredibly hostile environments.
    • Actually I guess "Happy Anniversary" is a bit more appropriate...
    • They are not trying to save on the shipping cost from country of manufacture to country where it is sold. Shaving just a few ounces off a product can have big savings in overall shipping costs when manufactured in large quantities.

    • Re:Happy Birthday! (Score:5, Informative)

      by Cally ( 10873 ) on Friday January 04, 2008 @05:14PM (#21915926) Homepage
      Spirit is in a bad way; unlike Opportunity, which has had several recent cleaning events and is still generating 650Whr/day, Spirit's solar panels have been steadily acculumulating dust ever since it left the crest of Husband Hill and descended into the dust-trap valley containing Home Plate. It's just been parked an over-wintering site right on the northern rim of Home Plate, which was picked because it allows up to a 25 degree northward tilt, turning the solar panels perpendicular to the sun and wringing every last watt from it's light. Spirit may survive the winter, but it's by no means certain. We do now know that the rovers can survive on less than half the official "rover death" power levels, because both made it through the global dust storm. Spirit's power levels should bottom out around 125Whr in (I think) about four months' time. It's going to be touch and go. With luck we may get another two earth years from her. Oppy, on the other hand, is still going strong. If some major mechanical failure turned it into a stationary weather-station vehicle, rather like Viking, it could conceivably last another five years - until the batteries finally lose capacity.

      • Re: (Score:2)

        by barzok ( 26681 )

        With luck we may get another two earth years from her.
        I think we should consider it fortunate that Spirit has lasted as long as she has. Designed for 90 days, at this point it's all gravy - she could go offline tomorrow and still be a resounding success.
        • I really don't buy that the rovers were designed for only 90 days. It was just the "warranty", if they survived for 90 days they could call the mission a victory and get the pressure off. IMO they were designed to last at least a martian year.

          Don't get me wrong, it's a fantastic mission, I still follow it weekly, and the rovers are performing amazingly well, but they were not designed to break down after 90 days.

          • Re: (Score:2)

            by splutty ( 43475 )
            The original estimate of 90 days was not based on their structural integrity, but on a guestimate of the buildup of dust on the solar panels, and how long it would take for them to become inoperable.

            The first storm they got suddenly turned out to be a blessing in that the solar panels were blown clean, plus the fact that they were able to function on much lower power than originally thought also boosted their lifespan.

            They were afraid that the storms would deposit more dust on the panels, and just make them
    • The team that built this sweated every moment of the project. Squyers was a hell of a project manager too. But the engineers deserve a hell of a lot of credit. Those rovers were only supposed to last 90 sols. At 1462 that means that Spirit has gone 16 times longer than it should have.

  • Obligatory (Score:5, Funny)

    by Matthaeus ( 156071 ) on Friday January 04, 2008 @03:54PM (#21914412) Homepage
    I'm doing science and I'm still alive!

    (Sorry, someone had to!)
    • That's true; but then, are you alive and doing science ... on Mars!

      Good luck with that.

    • Re: (Score:1, Funny)

      by Chyeld ( 713439 )
      This was a triumph.
      I'm making a note here: huge success.
      It's hard to overstate my satisfaction.

      Aperture science.
      We do what we must because we can.
      For the good of all of us
      Except the ones who are dead.

      (Chorus 1)
      But there's no sense crying over every mistake
      You just keep on trying till you run out of cake
      And the science gets done and you make a neat gun
      For the people who are still alive.

      I'm not even angry.
      I'm being so sincere right now.
      Even though you broke my heart and killed me.
      And tore me to pieces.
      And thr
    • They're looking for mars cake. I'm sure it's delicious and moist.
    • Yeah, but we don't want to hear about any craters YOU'RE observing...

  • "Doing science," eh? Just like that Hubble story not too long ago. If these rovers find a comet that contains Atmospherium, it could mean real advances in the field of science.

  • Amazing feats of engineering (Score:5, Interesting)

    by hansamurai ( 907719 ) <hansamurai@gmail.com> on Friday January 04, 2008 @03:57PM (#21914466) Homepage Journal
    Every time I read about these rovers, I'm impressed. How often is something designed and built for a short period of time that last X times longer that it should? (16x for Spirit and Opportunity for those who are counting!) It's usually the total opposite, designing something to last 20 years and it turns out to last far fewer and that's even with regular maintenance. These rovers are on a dusty planet and haven't been worked on by human hands in a long time. These are really triumphs in technology if you ask me. I'm also similarly impressed with something like Voyager 1 which was launched 30+ years ago and is still communicating with Earth, but that's in the vacuum of space and doesn't really have a lot of unknown variables (besides the recent entry into the termination shock region).

    • Re: (Score:2)

      by xaxa ( 988988 )
      It works if you pay! Modern consumer equipment is designed to fail (at least, according to engineers at my university).

      Something like a subway train is an example of modern equipment that lasts for ages -- from what I see, they don't really break down, they just get sold to North Korea or somewhere and newer, fancier models brought in.

      The rover is still very impressive!

      • Re: (Score:3, Insightful)

        by LWATCDR ( 28044 )
        "t works if you pay! Modern consumer equipment is designed to fail (at least, according to engineers at my university)."
        It often is because it is price to durability trade off.
        A good example is an old Compaq we have at our office. It is an old PII that went from a workstation to a test database server. The test worked so well that we are still using it as a database server. We often toss old IBMs when they are just too slow to use for anything but they are still working just fine and dandy.
        Some consumer stu

  • Error (Score:5, Informative)

    by MyLongNickName ( 822545 ) on Friday January 04, 2008 @03:59PM (#21914506) Journal
    Title: Mars Rover, Spirit, Turns 4
    Summary: ""Designed for a 90 day mission, the Spirit Mars Rover is starting its 4th year of exploration"

    "Beginning 4th year" is not the same as turning 4.

    You start your 2nd year of life when you turn 1.
  • some Congresscritter doesn't read this... or they'll slash the project's budget 16.22 times!

  • Hurray! (Score:5, Interesting)

    by Anonymous Coward on Friday January 04, 2008 @04:05PM (#21914598)
    I've followed these things from back when they were still called Athena. Yet I still rather believed that when they said they would have a 90 day nominal mission they were purposely underselling them a little. However, when I read Steven Squyres' book Roving Mars a couple months ago and saw how much effort they put into cramming every inch of solar panels they could onto the rover because they were convinced the chances of having accumulated too much dust to continue operations after 3 months were pretty high, it was clear they were genuinely concerned about meeting their mission objectives.

    In the end, of course, they landed in good weather, and much of what dust did accumulate was blown clear by dust devils. And of course, the rovers have proven to be fairly robust mechanically, as well.

    NASA had clearly stated that they needed 90 days (and a few other milestones) to meet their mission objectives, but they planned from the beginning on them lasting at least a little bit longer because they put so much work into them and the 90 days was based on pessimistic dust estimates. Because of that, they budgeted an optional 90 day mission extension conditionally on them being operational at the end of the first three months. Furthermore, a second extension of 180 days was allowed if they were still in fair shape at that time (fingers crossed). But when they reached 1 year and the rovers were still going strong, they had to get special approval from Congress for funds to continue paying the operations team.

    That right there tells you that no one at NASA really believed these things would last more than a year, much less four! If they did, they would have been pushing to keep their job budgeted for longer than 12 months in advance.

  • Non-relative time measurment please. (Score:5, Insightful)

    by B5_geek ( 638928 ) on Friday January 04, 2008 @04:11PM (#21914724)
    Is that in Earth years or Mars years?

    It's about time NASA and all other space agencies adopt 10-base time systems.

    Or hell even StarDates a la StarTrek.
    • Wow, I think time should be measured in manner in which all "HUMANS" can comprehend. Perhaps you should use metric time...lol.
    • How would a base 10 system resolve Mars Years vs Earth Years?
    • Too late --- we already missed the 100 megasecond party.
    • Is that in Earth years or Mars years? It's about time NASA and all other space agencies adopt 10-base time systems. Or hell even StarDates a la StarTrek.

      Who uses Mars years to tell time? Earth years work perfectly fine for us, considering we are all from Earth (I think) and everything else we do is rather Earth-centric. Besides, StarTrek-style stardates don't even work for StarTrek. From wikipedia:

      "Within a single episode, TNG writers have most commonly increased stardates at the rate of one unit per E

  • They'd better get busy. They've only got a few more years to set up the soundstage for the next scheduled "moon landings" in the 2020s!

    - RG>
  • Are those earth years or martial years?
    • Oops, should have been martian, not martial.

      • -- See that "Preview" button?

        I did. Apparently you missed it. Tip: It's the one directly left of the 'Submit' button, usually. ;)

        Congratulations to the rovers, the people that built them and the people that continue to work with them.

    • Are those earth years
      Of course they are. Can't be bothered with a quick Wikipedia search [wikipedia.org]?

      or martial years?
      You mean "Martian" I guess.

      See that "Preview" button?
      Congratulations: sanctimonious, hypocritical, and ironic, all in four small words!
  • Well, is there water on Mars or microbes, bacteria, aliens? What have we discovered? Have we learned anything from the rock samples or pictures? Can you give me something that justifies all of this money spent? I like the romantic idea of NASA inspiring young kids to enter the fields of math and sciences just as much as the next person. But, we've spent a lot of money on these missions. Can you justify the money spent by telling me what we've learned? And how what we've learned can improve humanity?

    • Re:So what have we learned? (Score:5, Insightful)

      by Quadraginta ( 902985 ) on Friday January 04, 2008 @04:44PM (#21915372)
      What have we discovered? Have we learned anything from the rock samples or pictures?

      You're confusing data collection with theorizing. What we've "learned" is gigabytes of photographs, measurements, and so forth, which will, in the coming years, be used to sort through the various theories about the formation and evolution of Mars, and (more indirectly) about the possibility of life on it.

      It seems likely there is something missing in your understanding of how science works, because you seem under the impression that we come up with theories and then we go do an experiment that confirms them, and if it does, that's successful science.

      Doesn't work that way. What we do is go out and collect oodles of data, pretty much anything we can measure, regardless of whether or not it is relevant to anyone's pet pre-existing speculations. Then we sit down and try to explain all this data, correlate it with other data, et cetera. That's when the theories get formed, and shot down. It is, generally speaking, just a total waste of time to theorize when you have no data. That's religion, or politics, or some such non-scientific endeavor. In science we collect data first, and then we theorize, because only then can our theories acquire the solid backing of empirical fact and become actually useful. You have, in essence, imagined that the theoretical cart comes before the empirical horse.

      Can you give me something that justifies all of this money spent?

      Of course not. You can only do that yourself, and if you've already looked into what the rovers are doing and concluded it doesn't suit your philosophical goals, then that's that. Why would you even want a meme transplant from someone else that would make you feel differently about the money spent?

      But it doesn't matter. The way it works is, we all get to decide for ourselves whether we like government money spent this way -- for whatever reason, e.g. because we think knowing how Mars formed is nifty, because we like seeing photos from the ground from Mars, because of your and NASA's 'inspiring the kids' hooey, or just because it keeps government cash from otherwise being thrown down the rathole of futile social engineering or bureaucrat full-employment programs. Then we tally up the votes. If there are more of us who think the money is well spent, it gets spent, whatever you folks on the losing side think.

      As it is, those of us who like rovers poking around on Mars have more votes than those of you who don't. I can easily see why you would want to convince us that it's money wasted, so some of us might change our minds and you might become the new majority. But why would you imagine any of us in the majority would want to waste our time trying to convince you to change your mind? Who cares whether you do or not?
      • See subject line.

      • Re: (Score:3, Informative)

        by Cally ( 10873 )

        You're confusing data collection with theorizing. What we've "learned" is gigabytes of photographs, measurements, and so forth, which will, in the coming years, be used to sort through the various theories about the formation and evolution of Mars, and (more indirectly) about the possibility of life on it.

        As a matter of fact, several major discoveries and have been made by the rovers. Silica Valley, Tyrone, blueberries, festoon cross-bedding, 3D bedform cross-sections at Victoria Crater, the first ever surface-based observations of a global dust storm, of high atmospheric clouds, first meteorites on the surface of another planet, movies of dust devils, oh the list just goes on and on...

    • Re:So what have we learned? (Score:5, Insightful)

      by Guysmiley777 ( 880063 ) on Friday January 04, 2008 @04:51PM (#21915534)
      You're so right. I mean the $800 million spent on the rovers could have funded almost 3 entire days of the war in Iraq. And look at all of the scientific data we've gotten out of that. Right?

    • Re: (Score:3, Insightful)

      by Zanix ( 684798 )
      Most of the data NASA has gained helps out NASA. There is very little of it that is useful in the public's eyes. For instance, wind patterns, weather changes, and soil solidity don't give the public much information. On the other hand, those things allow NASA to plan out future missions better. They have the ability to take soil samples but they obviously haven't gotten any ground shattering information yet as otherwise we would have heard something. The big thing we get out of this is that instea

    • Re: (Score:3, Informative)

      by Cally ( 10873 )

      Well, is there water on Mars or microbes, bacteria, aliens? What have we discovered? Have we learned anything from the rock samples or pictures? Can you give me something that justifies all of this money spent?

      Well, golly gee, if only there were some way to answer your questions! Perhaps some sort of searchable index of information on web pages... [google.co.uk]

    • Re: (Score:3, Informative)

      by iamlucky13 ( 795185 )
      We've learned with near certainty that there were large amounts of liquid water on Mars in the past. This shows that Mars was almost certainly more like Earth in its past, may still maintain some suitability for human life, and brightens hopes of finding extra-solar, earth-like planets.

      We've studied the geological history of Mars in detail that was utterly impossible via any other means short of landing actual people there. This hints at the similarities and differences between Mars and Earth and may hel

    • Re:So what have we learned? (Score:5, Interesting)

      by WindBourne ( 631190 ) on Friday January 04, 2008 @07:44PM (#21917524) Journal
      1. Learned how to land missions on mars.
      2. Learned how to make a moving piece of equipment work on mars for at least 5 years.
      3. Have learned a bit about the weather conditions there, in particular, depending only on solar may be a big mistake. We have seen a massive storm move in and almsot kill the vehicles. Likewise, have an idea of the extremes there.
      4. Have learned a bit about the physical make up of the planet. In particular, lots of minerals that many thoerized would not be there, but are.
      And that was ust a quick list. Here is more [space.com] Yes, all in all, these 2 were WELL worth their money. If you want the info, there is still a load of it that has not been looked it closely enough. Please, have at it.
  • Hey NASA, aparently you hired a company or companies who are very good at what they do, building things. PLEASE contract with them again.
    • amen. perhaps they should use tyco. at least my rc doesn't get stuck on large rust colored rocks...lol.

    • Re: (Score:2)

      by Tablizer ( 95088 )
      Hey NASA, aparently you hired a company or companies who are very good at what they do, building things. PLEASE contract with them again.

      Wouldn't that be a major bummer if their contract stipulated that they didn't get paid until *after* the rovers cease functioning, and the builders since went bankrupt. I wouldn't put it past the gov't to F-up like that.
  • I get first dibs on lurking around Delta Labs with a machine gun when we build our outposts on Mars.
  • [root@spirit ~]# uptime
    15:27:50 up 1460 days, 3:53, 1 user, load average: 0.43, 0.58, 0.61

    It must run Linux...

    • Re: (Score:1, Informative)

      by Anonymous Coward
      It runs a modified version of VX Works, actually. Programmed by my friends at Wind River, I do believe.

    • Re: (Score:2, Informative)

      by Enleth ( 947766 )
      AFAIK, they were rebooted at least once for a firmware upgrade, so that number wouldn't look so nice...
  • not!

    but still amazing that opportunity may witness an asteroid impact "nearby".

    http://edition.cnn.com/2007/TECH/space/12/21/mars.asteroid.ap/index.html [cnn.com]

    http://science.slashdot.org/article.pl?sid=07/12/31/1435223 [slashdot.org]
  • I am a bit surprised that they didn't just rig some wipers up for the solar panels! They clearly overengineered the rovers for the initially expected mission duration - why didn't they add a small, simple way for themselves to dust themselves off and keep the power coming?

    It's okay. It's absolutely fabulous having Spirit and Opportunity there, let alone still working at all.
  • ... would keep the next batch of intrepid robots doing science for at least a decade. I'm not going to try to patent the idea because it would fail the obviousness test.

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