Mars rover plans its escape

[n2doc]

Crunch time approaches for a decision on how to free Spirit from a sand trap.

Katharine Sanderson

After being stuck in soft soil on Mars for six months, Spirit, one of two NASA rovers on the red planet, is about to attempt an escape.

"It's likely that this process will take months and we don't even know if we'll be successful," says John Callas, project manager for Spirit and its twin rover Opportunity at NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory in Pasadena, California. Spirit landed on Mars in January 2004 for what was originally planned as only a three-month mission.

The attempted drive out of the soft, floury soil that Spirit drove into accidentally in May this year comes after a seven-member review panel took a close look at the recovery effort on 28 October. The panel recommended that the rover project team should try to extract Spirit as soon as possible. Time is of the essence — as winter approaches, power from Spirit's solar panels wanes. "The coming winter could pose a risk to the rover," says Callas.

Back in May, as Spirit drove across a sloping area near the planet's equator called Home Plate, the solid crust gave way to reveal soft ground beneath, and Spirit's five (out of six) functional wheels couldn't get enough grip to drive out. Instead, the rover sank deeper like a car spinning its wheels in deep snow. The sixth wheel hasn't worked since March 2006.

more:
http://www.nature.com/news/2009/091105/full/news.2009.1066.html

[MilesColtrane]

1. Where the hell is triple A when you need them?

[BadgerKid]

6. .

I asked myself that last week when I got stranded and they refused to send help.

[LoveIsNow]

2. I thought those things were dead

We really should be giving NASA all the funding we can. They obviously get their money's worth, if they were supposed to last three months and are still running around almost six years later.

[caraher]

4. Sometimes yes, sometimes no

The rovers are a smashing success. Then there's the mission that failed because the scientists work in kilometers and the engineers in miles. We've has a great return on these "cheap" robot missions and a poor return on some other endeavors like the ISS.

There are worthy projects that definitely deserve much more funding, but I wouldn't open my wallet just because a project has a NASA logo on it...

[Rhiannon12866]

3. Wishing the little guy luck...

Not to mention the huge amount of time and money spent on this project. Spirit reminds me of that cute little robot in the movie... ;)

[byronius]

5. Strangely, I just finished writing a screenplay in which

the hero invents a forcefield that he uses to go to Mars and fix and free all the rovers, including the Sojourner. One of the payoff scenes involves JPL watching as an image rolls in from a rover with a human hand holding a sign that says: "Ryan Was Here."

http://www.byronscripts.com