NASA Says Goodbye to Its Longtime Mars MAVEN Mission (nytimes.com) 10
NASA has officially ended the MAVEN mission after the Mars orbiter stopped responding in December, apparently after an unexpected spin drained its batteries and knocked out communications. Launched in 2013 and orbiting Mars since 2014, MAVEN spent more than a decade studying how the planet lost its atmosphere and helped explain how Mars transformed from a potentially habitable world into the cold, dry planet seen today. The New York Times reports: The NASA spacecraft MAVEN, short for Mars Atmosphere and Volatile Evolution, had been orbiting around the Red Planet since 2014. NASA last received a signal from MAVEN on Dec. 6, shortly before the spacecraft passed behind Mars. Then the spacecraft stopped responding. A review board found that MAVEN began unexpectedly rotating, causing its batteries to drain too quickly and resulting in a loss of power to the communications system.
"The team is certainly broken up about this," said Shannon Curry, the principal investigator of the mission and a scientist at the University of Colorado Boulder, at a news conference on Wednesday. "But at the same time, we are incredibly proud of the science we've accomplished over the last decade." NASA officials declined to speculate on the root cause of the mishap. A final report is expected to be released later this year.
"The team is certainly broken up about this," said Shannon Curry, the principal investigator of the mission and a scientist at the University of Colorado Boulder, at a news conference on Wednesday. "But at the same time, we are incredibly proud of the science we've accomplished over the last decade." NASA officials declined to speculate on the root cause of the mishap. A final report is expected to be released later this year.
Noticed a lot of endings today (Score:5, Funny)
Isn't there a rule of threes?
Let's see...Stargate, Mars Maven, imaginary girlfriend...That's it.
A teaser set it spinning (Score:1)
"A teaser?"
"Yeah."
"Er, what is ..."
"A teaser? Teasers are usually rich kids with nothing to do. They cruise around looking for planets which haven't made interstellar contact yet and buzz them."
"Buzz them?" Arthur began to feel that Ford was enjoying making life difficult for him.
"Yeah", said Ford, "they buzz them. They find some isolated spot with very few people around, then land right by some poor soul whom no one's ever going to believe and then strut up and down in front of him wearing silly
It could have been worse (Score:5, Insightful)
Re: (Score:3)
MAVEN is mentioned in the article you linked as a candiiidate for cancellation. Looks like there's no need now.
Many administrations have sought to cancel unmanned scientific missions, and boost whizz-bangy manned ones. But the current administration seems particularly focused on those objectives. I suppose it also helps their cause to cancel scientific missions with environmental objectives -- many of which are mentioned in your linked article.
Do you think they want to put humans back on the moon before Chi
A failure for our time (Score:4, Funny)
Re: (Score:2)
Re: (Score:3)
You deserve a +1 Funny :)
And maybe a +1 Informative also.
"Spin doctors" literally exist for spacecraft, in the guise of Attitude and Control Systems (ACS) or Guidance, Navigation and Control (GNC) engineers.
You want some spacecraft to spin, in order to keep them stable and have their instruments sweep out 360-degree(*) coverage of the environment on every rotation.
(*) Or 4-pi steradian coverage, if you "spin" that way. ;-P
K'Breel (Score:2)
Score one for K'Breel and the Council of Elders, I guess. We'll get you next time, you crafty Martians!