Mars Rover Spirit Falls Silent ...

[Verto]

Originally posted by Agathon


You owe us all ten bucks compensation for having to read that.

Don't we already have a thread about reparations?

[Japher]

You owe us all ten bucks compensation for having to read that.

We'll call it reparations

[chequita guevara]

I call it gas. I fart in your general direction.

[MrFun]

Wow -- I think I have just been lynched.

[Gatekeeper]

I agree with whoever it was who said robotic probes would be a good way of preparing a site on Mars for eventual human habitation. Perhaps ferrying advance supplies and the like. Right now, the probes that do succeed in reaching Mars are mainly scientific in nature.

As for NASA funding, it sounds like prretty much every other program will be gutted in order to even approach the dollar amount needed just to get to the moon and establish a permanent presence there. If Bush is genuinely serious about this, he's going to have to cough up a lot more funding, IMO.

Bad thing with the Hubble. That's a real nice asset to have. Too bad we shall likely lose the use of it within a few years (its gyroscopes — critical to the telescope's function — are failing ... one is already down, and the other two are wearing out).

One thing's for sure ... even if Earth were destroyed tomorrow, and humanity taken with it, there'd be relics of us left scattered throughout the Solar System (and beyond, what with Voyager somewhere near or beyond the Oort Cloud by now).

Gatekeeper

[Winston]

Regarding the Hubble Telescope, I read that after the decision was made not to service it further, it is now estimated it will continue in service until 2008. And in 2011 (or was that 2014, I'm not entirely sure), a new international telescope should be in place orbiting and exploring the deep space with a vastly improved capacity and data quality compared to Hubble. So it's not like that part of space exploration will be terminated, it'll just be on hold for a few years because the US have now also decided on more ambitious programmes.

[Winston]

It's called the James Webb Space Telescope, and will indeed be going up in 2011 according to The Hubble Site.

Plans are still underway for the James Webb Space Telescope, Hubble's successor, which would be launched in 2011. JWST will be designed to view objects in visible light and infrared, and its mirror will have six times the area of Hubble's mirror. Its goal is to study the first stars and galaxies that formed in the early universe. JWST will operate 1 million miles (1.5 million km) away from the Earth, and will not be serviceable from orbit.

[dannubis]

Originally posted by yavoon


yes lets abolish a program that accomplishes something and replace it w/ a program that gives money to ppl who accomplish nothing.

I bet thats how all great nations are built.

I hope you never find yourself in a situation where you become dependent on this kind of support...

[Gatekeeper]

Winston:

That's the first I've heard of the JWST ... if it stays on track, then losing Hubble won't be so bad.

Right now, apparently the public and some senators aren't too happy with the idea of Hubble being left to its own devices. Sen. Barbara Mikulski (D-Calif., I think) is among those ranks. It's even gone so far as to suggest that maybe Russia could help, or that Hubble could be brought to the ISS for repairs. All interesting stuff, but it the JWST is an almost guarantee, well, maybe the fuss over Hubble will fade away.

Gatekeeper

[alva]

without NASA, we ouwldnt have Postropedic Matresses!!! Or those pens that can write upside down! How dare you ask what has NASA done for you

Pencil.

[CerberusIV]

The problem with Hubble and the JWST is that Hubble will almost certainly go down before JWST is up leaving a gap of probably about 4 years.

And they have yet to figure out how to stop any bits of Hubble that don't burn up on re-entry landing on someone's head.

[Eli]

http://www.jpl.nasa.gov/releases/2004/29.cfm

NASA's Spirit rover communicated with Earth in a signal detected by NASA's Deep Space Network antenna complex near Madrid, Spain, at 12:34 Universal Time (4:34 a.m. PST) this morning.

The transmissions came during a communication window about 90 minutes after Spirit woke up for the morning on Mars. The signal lasted for 10 minutes at a data rate of 10 bits per second.

Mission controllers at NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory, Pasadena, Calif., plan to send commands to Spirit seeking additional data from the spacecraft during the subsequent few hours.

[Brundlefly]

Originally posted by chegitz guevara

Yeah, cuz the Democrats have sure spent so much money on the poor. When has the United States ever had any kind of social democratic pretentions? The only time the U.S. came close, the so-called War on Poverty, it got derailed, not by the space program, but the WAR ON VIETNAM!

I think we were moving towards Socialism in early 20th century until Bolshevik revolution scared people away.

FDR is the closest thing we've ever had to a socialist democrat.

Certainly Democrats today, at least the moderate Clinton Democrats, pay too much lip service to social programs, but at least they show more concern than Republicans.

Democrats are the lesser of two evils. I think it is more worthwhile to work on them to become more liberal than to throw my lot in with a weak also-ran organization like Libertarians or Communists who have no chance of getting their agenda pushed through in American politics.

You always act like it's this either or propoistion. Either we explore space or we feed the poor. NASA gets a pittance. Half the Federal budget is taken up paying for past and future wars (some of which goes to NASA). Then there's all the money spent on corporate welfare. If you kvetched abuot the moeny we spend on everything else, maybe you'd at least be logically consistent when it comes to NASA's budget. As it is, you only trot out this argument for NASA.

Well you've done a good job right there explaining about the money we've wasted on everything else, so now I have nothing to add.

I guess I'm fixated on NASA because I see a stark contrast between astronauts walking on Mars and many of the social problems we face. I just dont see why Bush needs 15 billion for NASA to have us walk on Mars. Someone please show me the cost-benefit analysis.

[DanS]

The problem with Hubble and the JWST is that Hubble will almost certainly go down before JWST is up leaving a gap of probably about 4 years.

They're seriously considering moving JWST up one year, so the gap would be between 2 years and 4 years. Furthermore, they have to ramp up funding for JWST well before they launch it. If Hubble were in place as they ramped up funding, then the overall NASA astronomy budget would have had to be increased drastically.

[Whoha]

they got about 30 minutes of transmission with the rover today. I bet the other lander suffers the same problem this guy is going through.