Phoenix Mars Lander (large images presumably to follow)

x-post -- Wow, that's wonderful. I love the fact that stuff like this might become even more common with time.

What are the chances this is 100% what we think it is and they're not secretly doing some secret military secret stuff like, er, looking for radioactive oil or something?

I've generally assumed that if there was secret operations going on then the funding for these missions would be fast-tracked (if not medium-tracked) and JPL wouldn't have to constantly beg on streetcorners for cash.

NASA/JPL is not sweating it financially compared to almost all other big ticket science in the U.S. and pretty much all other science worldwide.

(e.g. so fucked: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/International_Linear_Collider#Cost_and_time_estimates)

(which is not to say I think the 5.6 trillion dollars spent by the U.S. on its nuclear arsenal could not have been better spent, but NASA/JPL is one of the wealthiest public science bodies in the world and is not begging on street corners.)

NASA/JPL is one of the wealthiest public science bodies in the world and is not begging on street corners.)

True. But overall NASA has been reneging on promises that they originally made to the science programs in terms of the amount of funding that they would be getting.

In short, politics as usual. http://www.nasawatch.com/ gets nice and irate about this.

This is pretty interesting...

25 May note: I had a rather strange case of deja vu tonight as the first images from Phoenix flashed on my computer screen. The image on the left was taken on 25 May 2008 on Mars at 68 deg North. I took the picture on the right on Devon Island, 75 deg North in July 2007. I'm just saying ... those polygonal patterns on Mars are VERY familiar.

http://images.spaceref.com/news/2008/mars.devon.m.jpg

(Devon Island is where several research groups have been operating because it's considered to be a pretty good analog to Mars. Er... I'll say!)

Capricorn Two!

Uhh... WOW! http://www.planetary.org/blog/article/00001468/

They announced at this morning's press conference that yesterday, when they first looked at their photo of Phoenix under its parachute, the HiRISE team failed to really take in the context of the image. Well, here it is, and -- prepare to have to pick your jaw up off the floor.

http://www.planetary.org/image/PSP_008579_9020_descent_lg.jpg

Phoenix against Heimdall crater as it lands
This amazing image was captured as Phoenix came in for its Mars landing on May 25, 2008. The HiRISE camera on Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter pointed at Phoenix, which is seen here against the background of a 10-kilometer-diameter crater called Heimdall. The dramatic view makes it appear that Phoenix is falling into the crater, but in fact Phoenix was 20 kilometers closer to HiRISE than Heimdall, and it landed nowhere near the crater. The photo was taken 20 seconds after Phoenix' parachute opened. Credit: NASA / JPL / U. Arizona

fuck

So cool. I heard about this on the radio this morning.

And HiRISE snaps Phoenix on the surface (along with the heat shield and parachute)

http://www.universetoday.com/wp-content/uploads/2008/05/phoenix-total-580x560.jpg

That is just so cool! Thanks!

The crater pic in particular blew my mind.

JESUS that crater photo. Holy god.

I, for one, welcome our new polygon overlords.

The crater photo is astounding. Especially if you follow the link and look at the enlarged version.

new desktop background

Is the ground around Phoenix darker due to the landing thrusters do you reckon?

I like what Bad Astronomy had to say about the parachute picture:

That is exactly what you think it is: Phoenix descending to the Martian surface underneath its parachute. This incredible shot was taken by the HiRISE camera on board the Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter. You can easily see the ‘chute, the lander (still in its shell) and even the tether lines!

Think on this, and think on it carefully: you are seeing a manmade object falling gracefully and with intent to the surface of an alien world, as seen by another manmade object already circling that world, both of them acting robotically, and both of them hundreds of million of kilometers away.

Never, ever forget: we did this. This is what we can do.

Yeah, what he said^.
This is what the word "awesome" was invented for.

Sublime, in the truest sense of the word.

ICE IS NICE

A view of the ground underneath NASA's Phoenix Mars Lander adds to evidence that descent thrusters dispersed overlying soil and exposed a harder substrate that may be ice.

The image received Friday night from the spacecraft's Robotic Arm Camera shows patches of smooth and level surfaces beneath the thrusters.

"This suggests we have an ice table under a thin layer of loose soil," said the lead scientist for the Robotic Arm Camera, Horst Uwe Keller of Max Planck Institute for Solar System Research, Katlenburg- Lindau, Germany.

"We were expecting to find ice within two to six inches of the surface," said Peter Smith of the University of Arizona, Tucson, principal investigator for Phoenix. "The thrusters have excavated two to six inches and, sure enough, we see something that looks like ice. It's not impossible that it's something else, but our leading interpretation is ice."

http://www.nasa.gov/images/content/234082main_under-427.jpg

I also want to add that "lead scientist for the Robotic Arm Camera, Horst Uwe Keller of Max Planck Institute for Solar System Research," is the greatest name/title/affiliation combination ever.

is the DVD copy protected?

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Image:Phoenix_mini-DVD_on_Mars.jpg

This isn't really coming from Mars though, is it?

http://twitter.com/MarsPhoenix

Well the data is coming from Mars, scientists are interpreting it and an intern is anthropomorphising it and posting it to twitter.

what a job!

OK, this is from Spirit not Phoenix, but whatevs. Holy shit.

http://www.nasa.gov/images/content/117989main_image_feature_347_ys_full.jpg

alien!

In phoenix news I hear they are having problems getting the dirt in the oven for mass spec.

xpost -- Well it's nice to know what the new Jesu album cover will be.

That Spirit shot is gorgeous.

Phoenix watches the clouds pass by

http://www.universetoday.com/wp-content/uploads/2008/09/phoenix-clouds.gif

Snowfall!

Remember the movies of clouds floating above the Phoenix Lander? Further study with the lander's Lidar instrument has detected snow falling from Martian clouds. "The clouds are composed of ice crystals, and some of the crystals are large enough to fall through the atmosphere," said Jim Whiteway, lead scientist for the Meteorological Station on Phoenix. Whiteway and several researchers shared recent findings from Phoenix at a press briefing today. "So snow is falling from the clouds and we are going to be watching very closely over the next month for evidence that the snow is actually landing on the surface. This is a very important factor in the hydrological cycle on Mars, with the exchange of water between the surface and the atmosphere."

"Nothing like this view has ever been seen on Mars," Whiteway added.

From Phoenix images and data, scientists have observed water condensing in the atmosphere. In recent weeks, as the temperatures fall in onset of winter on Mars' northern plains, frost, ground fog and clouds are prevalent. "This is now occurring every night," said Whiteway. "The Lidar is able to probe the inner structure of the clouds. It emits pulses of light upward into the atmosphere and detects what is scattered back. The laser emits pulses of light 100 times per second, so if you were standing beside the lander looking upward, you'd see a continuous green beam." Data and images of the beam show bright spots in beam is where it is reflecting off ice crystals, and also where it reflects off clouds, a few miles above the surface.

The snow starts falling from a height of 4 km and fall down to 2 km. At that point the observations stopped, as they were initially set up for a limited amount of time. Further observations will be done to see if the snow is actually falling down to the surface of the planet.

:-D I love stuff like this.

Snow on Mars! Such a beautiful image, would love to see it.

More on the snowfall at night

By the way, there's carbon-dioxide snow on Mars too

In 2008, we learned from the Phoenix Mars lander that it snows in Mars northern hemisphere — perhaps quite regularly – from clouds made of water vapor. But now, Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter data has revealed the clearest evidence yet of carbon-dioxide snowfalls on Mars. Scientists say this is the only known example of carbon-dioxide snow falling anywhere in our solar system.

“These are the first definitive detections of carbon-dioxide snow clouds,” said Paul Hayne from the Jet Propulsion Laboratory, lead author of a new study published in the Journal of Geophysical Research. “We firmly establish the clouds are composed of carbon dioxide — flakes of Martian air — and they are thick enough to result in snowfall accumulation at the surface.”

Scientists have known for decades that carbon-dioxide exists in ice in Mars’ seasonal and permanent southern polar caps. Frozen carbon dioxide, sometimes called “dry ice” here on Earth, requires temperatures of about -125 Celsius (- 193 degrees Fahrenheit), which is much colder than needed for freezing water.

Even though we like to think Mars is a lot like Earth, findings like this remind us that Mars is indeed quite different. But just as the water-based snow falls during the winter in Mars’ northern hemisphere, the CO2 snowfalls occurred from clouds around the Red Planet’s south pole during winter in the southern hemisphere.