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Kizzume
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Joined: 31 Dec 1969
Posts: 2831
Location: Tacoma, WA USA
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 Posted: Mon May 26, 2008 2:15 pm Post subject: Phoenix has landed |
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Well, it looks like it landed:
http://news.google.com/news?hl=en&q=nasa+mars&um=1&ie=UTF-8&sa=X&oi=news_group&resnum=1&ct=title
| Quote: | At NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory in Pasdena, Calif., where the mission is being monitored, the safe touchdown of the Phoenix brought cheers and smiles, said Randii Wessen, a NASA project system engineer. "We were all cheering and hugging. These things are like your children. You want them to succeed. We're all excited."
As the lander approached the planet's surface, "it gently touched the ground," he said. "At about five mph, it just parked [itself]. It's got about a one-degree tilt. It's just parked very neatly and flat. It's just great."
Once the dust raised by the descent thrusters settled after a few minutes, Phoenix was set to deploy its solar panel array so it can begin quickly generating electricity for its experiments and other on-board systems, Wessen said.
Once the panels are deployed, the lander was expected to begin sending data back to Earth via three orbiting spacecraft that will relay the information to project scientists. The first live photographs from Phoenix were expected to begin arriving about 10 p.m. EDT, he said. The lander will have to raise its camera mast and antenna mast before it could begin sending photos, he said.
The likely subject of those first photos will probably be the craft's solar panels to be sure that they properly deployed, according to Wessen.
The Phoenix now begins a three-month-long science mission made up of a series of soil analysis projects that involve digging lightly into the Mars surface to study the history of water, ice and life potential in the planet's soil.
"We think it's way cool," Wessen said of the successful landing. |
At least something is still happening in the space program. I hope they find out some useful information from this.
Here's a live feed from NASA in what they're doing right now.
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