# Mars Rovers...



## mosaix (Dec 2, 2008)

There was a thread, that I think must have been lost when the server crashed a few weeks ago, about the rovers and the plans for the coming months.

Here's an update...

Mars Exploration Rover Mission: Press Releases

One paragraph that interest me is:

_On Nov. 30, Spirit will begin a two-week period with no new commands sent from Earth, while the sun is between Earth and Mars. Even before the storm that is now subsiding, the rover team did not plan to drive Spirit away from its location at the north end of a low platform called "Home Plate" until after that period of suspended commanding. _

It never occurred to me that there would be periods on 'non communication', but I suppose it should have. 

Anyway, those things have been on Mars for five years now, a tribute to American engineering.


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## Spartan27 (Dec 2, 2008)

Have they figured out yet that there was a civilization up there a long time ago...perhaps 65 millions years ago??? Can't wait for that info to come out.


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## sloweye (Dec 2, 2008)

Some of the images now are great.

its a nice thought Spartan but we all know we will be th last to here that news


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## Nik (Dec 2, 2008)

Sorry, Mars has been bereft of high-level life for much longer than that--By current evidence, a couple of billion years. 

IIRC, Mars 'died' before aerobic life got going down here...

Hopefully, the legacy Arean Extremophiles are comfy in their saline aquifers, ready for the EuroMars Rover to drip them onto a microscope slide...


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## skeptic_heptic (Dec 22, 2008)

There was some news that they could have possibly found ice deposits on the surface.  Not entirely sure, but will need to confirm.  I'd say that's pretty exciting.


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## Nik (Dec 22, 2008)

*Ice caps...*

Sorry, HS, the Polar Explorer's arm was actually scratching and scraping at water-ice beneath superficial deposits at the High-Latitude landing site. That was the hard, white stuff in the shallow trench, as shown on TV...

Couple more weeks, now that the Martian winter has set in, the frost-bitten lander will be feet deep in CO2 snow...

RIP, Polar Explorer.

FWIW, here's a few sites that may be of interest...
SOLARCYCLE 24.com / Solar Cycle 24 / Spaceweather / Amateur Radio VHF Aurora Website.

SpaceWeather.com -- News and information about meteor showers, solar flares, auroras, and near-Earth asteroids

http://geology.com/news/

Physics News | Science News | Physics News | Physics | Material Sciences | Science

Learn More at Space.com. From Satellites to Stars, NASA information, Astronomy, the Sun and the Planets, we have your information here.


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## mosaix (Mar 25, 2010)

I missed this. Apparently NASA has abandoned plans to rescue the trapped rover, Spirit.

NASA officially abandons plan to rescue trapped Spirit - Science


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## Stephen Palmer (Mar 25, 2010)

I thought this was going to be a new kind of sweet.

Mars should make Rovers, though...


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## The Ace (Mar 25, 2010)

When they play E**land, I'll support them.


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## ktabic (Mar 25, 2010)

Sadly, despite half of Mars Rovers FC being trapped in sand, the pair of them would probably still win.


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## J Riff (May 29, 2011)

This thread deserves a new life.
There are now over 150,000 images of Mars available.
Back in the day, we would have salivated at the idea of any clear photos of the Red Planet.
Personally, I waited a few years, and sure enough, people scouted out a ton of 'anomalies' in the extant photographs.
Skulls, people, tubes, statues, tools, pyramids, faces... it's all there, but I'm not happy, it's not adding up.
A signifigant question would seem to be "When did Mars give up it's atmosphere, and more importantly, did it lose it all at once boom! and if so why? Was it 3.2 million yrs. ago - at the same time as the meteor that supposedly took out the dinosaurs on Earth?
 It almost makes sense. A meteor shower through the system and poof, there went the Martian atmosphere. Earth life survives, but with a reduced ozone layer etc.
 Well, maybe. What's bugging me is- Mars is less dense than Earth. Lighter gravity equals larger creatures. Where are they? 
 Or are we of the opinion there was never life on Mars?


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## RJM Corbet (May 29, 2011)

Yes, well I agree that's its fantastic to be able to see pictures and know so much about not only Mars but space in general, in the 21st century. Its one of the perks. It seems clear that there is water ice on Mars, at the poles.

One thing the recent Mars pictures have done at least is to put that stupid 'Cydonia Face' and pyramid site to rest once and for all ...


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## Metryq (May 29, 2011)

J Riff said:


> Was it 3.2 million yrs. ago - at the same time as the meteor that supposedly took out the dinosaurs on Earth?



Try _65 million_ years ago. Or you can force fit the dates to make the theory work, like Velikovsky or other modern-day catastrophists who take ancient myths at face value as historical accounts.


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## Vertigo (May 29, 2011)

We don't yet know for certain and maybe we never will, but it is most likely that Mars lost its atmosphere very slowly over a period of billions of years. Without a stong magnetosphere there was nothing to protect it from erosion by the solar wind and most of its water will have gone along with that.

http://science.nasa.gov/science-news/science-at-nasa/2001/ast31jan_1/
http://www.nasa.gov/mission_pages/mars/news/maven_20080915.html


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## RJM Corbet (May 29, 2011)

Good links, Vertigo. Thanks. Plenty there to brush up on ...


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## Vertigo (May 29, 2011)

Yeah, although it is interesting that they do not seem as convinced about the solar wind/lack of magnetosphere than I had thought. Typical media probably. They will have said they think this is a good candidate reason and the media will then probably have presented it as fact .

I think it is still the most likely candidate.


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## Metryq (May 29, 2011)

Venus has no magnetosphere, either, but it has an incredibly dense atmosphere. That atmosphere is being slowly eroded by the solar wind, which is also "inducing" an ionosphere. So it may take a very long time before Venus is airless. 

Meanwhile, the Moon has a "dust atmosphere" created by the solar wind.

Actually, the loss of Mars' atmosphere is easy to explain. Despite John Carter's efforts to get back into the atmosphere plant, it was the _observation_ of Mars that killed all life there and wiped away the atmosphere—just like Schrödinger's cat.


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## Vertigo (May 29, 2011)

Oh heck it's human fault again, we never should've looked 

Re Venus, it is possible that it has only lost its magnetsphere in relatively recent times as its core cooled. And the process of erosion by solar wind is a very slow one taking billions of years.

I think it will be very interesting to see the results of the MAVERN mission.


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## J Riff (May 30, 2011)

Big trouble re: Mars. The stuff I'm looking at now... and the story that goes with it... well I'm stunned.
 Stunned. I don't know what to think. I mean do. What to do?
Are people ready to see this stuff? Now I know, remember why this information is covered up. Un-believable.
 People are going to see it, I can't believe they haven't. Better go write a book I guess._ Bloody Red Planet of the Apes_...(TM*2011)
Stunned.


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## Nik (May 30, 2011)

You also have the issue of Mars' significantly smaller mass compared to Venus & Earth, making it that much harder to retain gasses...

Uh, IIRC, there's some evidence of a Mars mega-impact which gouged the 'Northern' depression, so that a lot of 'North' surface is lower than global average.

Uh, is that Geoid ? Areoid ? Marsoid ??

That impact, alone, may have removed half the atmosphere...

===

Uh, IIRC, some weeks ago, Spirit stopped responding to commands, and has now been abandoned.

RIP, Spirit...


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## Vertigo (May 30, 2011)

Indeed, RIP, she did some good work before she went.


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## J Riff (May 30, 2011)

I just wonder how long before someone blows Mars cover.
Are people ready yet? 
Small life, not. Teeming, yes.

Makes Earth look like a sandbox... no wonder it's been uhhhh covered up by wise government types.
Mercy.
Aliens, too? Sure looks like it, but they seem to have gone away.
Oh well. I needed this like a hole in the head..... I was supposed to be happy writing science fiction. But no, now Mars makes a lot of it look pretty tame.
 Horrific. I've actually joined a UFO board, just to see what people are ranting about, but the truth seems to be worse than any of their theories.


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## Nik (May 30, 2011)

"I just wonder how long before someone blows Mars cover."

Huh ??


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## J Riff (May 31, 2011)

Heck, I'm the anti-VonDaniken, I can't believe it meself.
It's really shocking, I mean _really_ is, when a major truth-moment comes along, all unexpected-like.

The recent UFO revelation hype... uhhhhhhhhh.... I thought, y'know, here we go again. 
But, it could all come out tomorrow, it could it could, and I am the last guy who would have believed that, a few days ago. 
Or, the lie could continue.
Fascinating, Spock, you'd better write a book about it.
Unbelievable. Go stare at Mars and see what you can see. I've seen enough. There is proof, more than enough, but it isn't what you might call pleasant.... and that's why it's been covered, all these years.
What are u on about Riff, aliens?
Yea. Probably. But Mars, even without aliens, is enough all on its own, to change most everything we thought we knew, into something else.
Go look, there's thousand o' photos. You may even see evidence of the humans who were taken up there to have a look around. )
Not joking. All my WIPs are on hold because of this madness. Bloody illuminati B@@&^^%!!


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## Dave (May 31, 2011)

J Riff said:


> You may even see evidence of the humans who were taken up there to have a look around!


You mean like all the litter, cigarette ends, broken bottles and drink cans; the graffiti left on those rocks, the burnt out car wrecks and piles of used tyres; and the shopping trolleys, of course.

I'm serious, if people had been there they would leave litter. There is litter at the summit of Mount Everest.

Getting back on subject, will the Mars Rover survive a winter of CO2 ice, or is that the end of it?


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## mosaix (May 31, 2011)

Dave said:


> I'm serious, if people had been there they would leave litter. There is litter at the summit of Mount Everest.



Nice down to Earth stuff, Dave. Good post.


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## Vertigo (May 31, 2011)

Dave said:


> ...
> Getting back on subject, will the Mars Rover survive a winter of CO2 ice, or is that the end of it?


 
Sadly Dave I think they have now given up on it:

http://marsrovers.jpl.nasa.gov/newsroom/pressreleases/20110524a.html


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## J Riff (May 31, 2011)

H*ll, when I was at Giza people were still writing graffitti on the walls. You'd think they were born in a barn. Tsk. The nerve of some modern humans.


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