Mars Rover Is Readied for Risky Red Planet Landing on Saturday

[rodbarnett]

By Andrew Bridges The Associated Press
Published: Jan 2, 2004

PASADENA, Calif. (AP) - After a journey of seven months and 303 million miles, a six-wheeled NASA rover will speed like a bullet Saturday night toward the surface of Mars and, if all goes as planned, stop with a bounce.
The plunge through the Martian atmosphere at 12,300 mph will mark the start of the riskiest portion of the voyage thus far.

http://ap.tbo.com/ap/breaking/MGAFOM5LYOD.html

[denverbill]

1. I hope one of these survives.

They've tried these stupid inflatable bubbles for two failed missions already.

Why the hell do they keep using them? We landed several probes safely many years ago with older technology. Seems to me if something isn't working you don't just keep doing it.

[DrWeird]

4. It worked fine with sojourner.

nt

[conservdem]

15. Are you sure about this? I thought this system has worked well. At least

it worked well with the one back in 97.

[DrWeird]

2. Looks like Beagle 2 didn't make it.

Too bad.

Let's hope this works.

We'd probably have rovers all over the system if NASA didn't waste so damn much on that stupid shuttle program.

[mouse7]

5. It all Howard Dean's fault

Dean lied about the landing site.

[Shadder]

10. Wrong

There are a couple of redneck Martians sitting on the back of a pickup truck shooting the dang things down as they come into view....

[arcane1]

11. and all this time, I thought it was the Clenis

its influence is very far-reaching, you know

[conservdem]

14. No, round here you say it's Bush's fault.

[spinbaby]

12. First picture from the probe

[boneygrey]

13. Gotta Love

Marvin the Martian. I think that "face" on Mars is shooting down all the probes.:tinfoilhat:

[conservdem]

16. Thanks for the laugh.

:toast:

[Thor_MN]

18. What happened to the kaboom?

There was supposed to be an Earth shattering kaboom!!

[Whoa_Nelly]

3. Most Awesome!

Sure hope it lands well...looking forward to the pics!

Welcome to DU, rodbarnett! :hi:

[Champion Jack]

6. Hmmmm, I hope this doesn't happen....

[Champion Jack]

7. or this

[denverbill]

8. ROFL!!

You should send that to NASA.

[arcane1]

9. News about something COOL?!?!?!??!??!?!?

wow, it feels like forever since I've read a news article that didn't send me into apoplectic fits :)

[qwertyMike]

17. Fingers Crossed

This will be awesome if it works.

[daleo]

19. Some statistics on Mars missions and other interplanetary probes

A while back (June 2003), I looked up all the moon and interplanetary missions (all nations), and did a quick analysis. The data is easy to find, on NASA and other sites.

The success rate for Mars was about 1/3 success to 2/3 failures. For the other planets (Venus, Mercury, Jupiter, Saturn, etc.) and the moon missions, the ratios were pretty well the reverse (2/3 success to 1/3 failure).

Moon: 27 failures, 45 successes (37.5% failure rate)
Mercury: 0 failures, 1 success (0% failure)
Venus: 18 failures, 30 successes (37.5% failure rate)
Mars: 24 failures, 13 successes (65% failure rate)
Jupiter, outer planets: 0 failures, 7 successes (0 % failure rate)
Asteroids: 1 failure, 2 successes (33% failure rate)

Note that if Beagle fails Mars would be 26 failures to 13 successes (including the recent Japanese failure).

The other interesting feature was that most of the failures for the other planets and moon were in the early days of space flight, especially the 1960's. But failures became less frequent as time went on. For Mars, that wasn't' true. The failure rate has been pretty constant, with perhaps the most successful period being around the time of the Viking missions in the 1970's.