Schiaparelli's Crash Site Seen By NASA MRO Probe

Schiaparelli, was due to touch down on Mars Wednesday morning (Oct. 19).   However the lander stopped communicating with ESA mission control about 1 minute before its planned touchdown.

The lander's crash site was photographed by NASA's Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter (MRO) and seemed to confirm what ExoMars team members had suspected — that Schiaparelli died a violent death.

It would appear that Schiaparelli dropped from a height of between 1.2 to 2.5 miles. This then would indicate that the lander impacted at a considerable speed, somewhere in excess of 186 mph.

It is also possible that the lander exploded on impact, as its thruster propellant tanks were likely still full.  those tanks were still full because Schiaparelli's data indicate that the lander didn't fire its descent-slowing thrusters nearly as long as it was supposed to, ESA officials said.

For more information please click  HERE 

http://www.space.com/34472-exomars-mars-lander-crash-site-photos.html

Schiaparelli's Crash Site Seen By NASA MRO Probe

Schiaparelli, was due to touch down on Mars Wednesday morning (Oct. 19).   However the lander stopped communicating with ESA mission control about 1 minute before its planned touchdown.

The lander's crash site was photographed by NASA's Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter (MRO) and seemed to confirm what ExoMars team members had suspected — that Schiaparelli died a violent death.

It would appear that Schiaparelli dropped from a height of between 1.2 to 2.5 miles. This then would indicate that the lander impacted at a considerable speed, somewhere in excess of 186 mph.

It is also possible that the lander exploded on impact, as its thruster propellant tanks were likely still full.  those tanks were still full because Schiaparelli's data indicate that the lander didn't fire its descent-slowing thrusters nearly as long as it was supposed to, ESA officials said.

For more information please click  HERE 

http://www.space.com/34472-exomars-mars-lander-crash-site-photos.html

Schiaparelli lander animation

The ExoMars 2016 mission, a colaboration between the ESA and Russian Roscosmos space agency, will enter Martian orbit on October 19 2016. The previously released Schiaparelli lander will begin its descent to the Martian surface. 

ExoMars comprises the Trace Gas Orbiter (TGO) and the Schiaparelli entry, descent and landing demonstrator.

TGO will make a detailed inventory of Mars’ atmospheric gases, with particular interest in rare gases like methane, which may indicate that there once was or is now implies that there is an active, and or current source. TGO aims to measure methane’s geographical and seasonal dependence and help to determine whether it stems from a geological or biological source.

TGO will start its science mission at the end of 2017, following a year of complex aerobraking manoeuvres to circularise its orbit. It will also act as a relay for ESA’s ExoMars 2020 rover.

Schiaparelli will separate from TGO on 16 October, entering the atmosphere for a six-minute descent to a region in Meridiani Planum, on 19 October.

Mars Mystery Plumes

In 2012 Amateur astronomers using telescopes on Earth were the first to report cloud-like plumes that reached heights of 155 miles above the surface of Mars. The feature developed in less than 10 hours, covered an area of up to 621 x 311 miles, and remained visible for around 10 days.

Frozen carbon dioxide and water are not thought to be able to form clouds of 155 miles high in the atmosphere.

The high altitude corresponds to the ionosphere, where the atmosphere directly interacts with the incoming solar wind of electrically charged atomic particles.  

Get complete article at the ESA page HERE

The ESA's comet lander Philae is probably dead.

Philae arrived at the surface of comet 67P, (also known as Churyumov-Gerasimenko) in 2014 - delivered there by ESA's Rosetta probe.

Philae and Rosetta communicated for 57 hours after-which Philae became sporadic and finally silent.


ESA has sent a "last-ditch" message to the lander in hopes of triggering a response-the bad news is that it seems to have failed.

click here for complete Wired Article

  

Barycentric Systems

Whaaaaa?

How many times have you tried to explain the Earth Moon system and their orbital dynamics?

The Earth and Moon orbit around each other at the point of equal mass or the Barycenter.   Any system that  has moving mass in balance with another has a center of mass.  The Solar System has such a center.   The Moon appears to orbit the Earth but in truth they both orbit the same center of mass.  The effect is a bit difficult to observe as the center is below the surface of the Earth so the movement is slight compared to the Moon.   It is the same with any planet or star that has bodies orbiting.

Check out this ESA short that has an excellent demonstration of just this effect.


<

Missing Beagle May Have Been Found

On December 19, 2003, the Mars Express orbiter released a tiny spaceship called the Beagle 2. The small lander streaked through the thin Martian atmosphere at well over 12 thousand miles per hour and was never heard from again. 

From the Global News article:

• After more than 11 years, European Space Agency officials reported that the Beagle 2 had been finally found – thanks to extensive detective work based on new photos taken by the high-resolution camera on NASA’s Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter.
• The photos show the craft landed safely on Mars and partially deployed — but was unable to fully deploy and start communicating.

The 143-pound Beagle 2 was designed to descend through the Martian atmosphere, deploy parachutes, and “bounce” to a safe landing on inflatable bags.

More from the Global News article:

• Experts who helped identify the lander at the University of Arizona’s Lunar and Planetary Lab said the photographs are “consistent” with only a partial deployment of the Beagle 2 upon landing. They said a failure to fully deploy would explain why no data or signals from the craft were ever received, since a complete deployment of all of its solar panels would have been needed for successful transmissions.

Complete article @ Global News  HERE

Comets Not the Source of Earth's Water!

Comets did not bring water to Earth.  This startling piece of news comes from scientists studying data coming back from the ESU's Rosetta.  The data, they feel, points towards asteroids as the watery culprits.  Still, other scientists want more data before ruling out comets completely.

Though the lander Philae's batteries have long since been depleted after it landed on comet  67P/Churyumov-Gerasimenko, November 12 2014, the "mother ship" Rosetta has continued to study the comet up close.


This historically close look at a comet may well answer the questions of whether it was possible that these primitive bodies brought water to Earth billions of years ago. Data  gathered by Rosetta's two mass spectrometers suggests this may not be the case.

The authors conclude it is more likely that the water came from asteroids, but other scientists say more data is needed before comets can be ruled out.

Since August, the Rosetta probe has been orbiting Comet 67P and on  November 12 Philae, touched down on the comet's surface.

This historically close look at a comet may well answer the questions of whether it was possible that these primitive bodies brought water to Earth billions of years ago.  Data gathered by Rosetta's two mass spectrometers suggests this may not be the case.







Earth's water is very distinctive. The majority on Earth is made up of two hydrogen and one oxygen atoms.  Infrequently one of the hydrogen atoms will be replaced with a deuterium atom - better known as "heavy water". Deutertium however is exceedingly rare.  For every 10,000 water molecules, three deuterium atoms can be found, a very distinctive ratio of light to heavy water, not easily changed and persists for a very long time.

When the team compared the water on Earth to that of Comet 67p, it was discovered that there was far more heavy water on Comet 67P than on Earth, more than three time that found on Earth.

 Complete BBC News online article HERE

Philae Lands on Comet Comet 67P

After a heart stopping seven-hour descent, the ESA Philae space-craft has indeed made history by being the first spacecraft ever to land softly on a comet. 

Philae's mother-ship - the Rosetta orbiter, transmitted the signal confirming the successful touchdown.  

Rosetta was launched on 2 March 2004 and traveled over 4 billion miles through the Solar System before arriving at the comet on 6 August 2014.

The landing site, named Agilkia and is located on the head of the bizarre double-lobed object.  Soon after Rosetta arrived, it began taking photos from apx, 20 miles to as far away as 60 miles looking for a possible landing site. 

From the Rosetta / ESA web site: 

• Those first images soon revealed the comet as a world littered with boulders, towering cliffs and daunting precipices and pits, with jets of gas and dust streaming from the surface. 

Philae was release at a distance of 15 miles and it made its decent, without propulsion or guidance.   

From the Rosetta / ESA web site: 

Over the next 2.5 days, the lander will conduct its primary science mission, assuming that its main battery remains in good health. An extended science phase using the rechargeable secondary battery may be possible, assuming Sun illumination conditions allow and dust settling on the solar panels does not prevent it. This extended phase could last until March 2015, after which conditions inside the lander are expected to be too hot for it to continue operating.

Philae's Wikipedia site  

CNN News Video

The ISS Has a Moment of "Gravity"

 In a moment reminiscent of Hollywood's 'Gravity', the ISS instead avoided being struck by space

debris. 

In late October, the ESA reported that the ISS lab was threatened with a collision by space junk.  The usual procedure is to have a docked Progress supply ship push the multi-toned craft out of harms way, which in this instance was a hand sized piece of metal from an earlier collision between a defunct Russian and an operational US satellite, traveling at 17000 mph.

The problem was however that there were none of the regular craft on station to pull duty until quick thinking controllers at the ESA ATV Control Center in Toulouse, France remembered that the ISS currently had the  Automated Transfer Vehicle Georges Lemaître, which ferries supplies to the station from Earth. The unmanned ship,  is controllable from Earth. Which meant that a team of engineers  at the ATV control center were able to use the supply craft to  move the ISS.

The Georges Lemaître, was instructed to fire its engine for 4 minutes which moved the ISS' orbit by one mile.

Complete Atlantic article HERE

Philae's Landing Site Now Has a Name

The science spacecraft Rosetta's lander, designated Philae is due to land on comet 67P/Churyumov-Gerasimenko November 12.  Up until recently the landing site was simply known as 'J'.  

The Philae steering committee, along with other agencies involved with the ESA Rosetta probe, asked the public for suggestions.  The name was finally narrowed down to Agilkia.  

Rosetta will release Philae on November 12 at a distance of 14 miles  from the center of the comet, with a scheduled landing about seven hours later at Agilkia.

Check out the complete article on Astronomy  HERE

Rosetta now in ORBIT!!!

The Rosetta spacecraft has after over a decade of maneuvering become the first probe to orbit a comet. Now I know that is going to raise a few hackles, but Ceres etc. were ASTEROIDS and mini-planets or dwarf planets.So Dawn et al were another class of probe and the few that DID approach were chasers or fly ahead types that did good science, it is Rosetta that will set the bar much higher.

Controllers instructed Rosetta to fire its thrusters on its final approach to Comet 67P/Churyumov-Gerasimenko, "Chury", on Wednesday August seventh.  They announced a half an hour after the burn, that the Rosetta had entered into orbit around the comet.

The Rosetta probe will remain in orbit, but plans are to get the probe to within 6 miles so the second history making part of the mission to take place.  Early in November of 2014 the lander Philae will set another historic first for the Rosetta mission by landing on the surface.  (that should prove quite a feat as Chury is swapping it's north and south poles at a fairly rapid interval)  when it lands on the comet.

From the NationalJournal website

• The 220-pound probe will deploy ice screws and harpoons as it hits the surface, because 67P's (Chury) minimal gravity is not enough to keep it anchored.

Planck Deep Space Telescope Retired

 

Launched in 2009 and instrumental in determining the true age of the universe, which was 80 million years older that scientists had estimated,  the Planck telescope is being retired.  

Planck  spent all of it's working life in deep space behind a super cooled detector, which, along with it's sister scope the Herschel Space Observatory, its primary function was to study some of the most ancient photons thought to have been created at the time of the big bang.  

Herschel went offline in April of this year, but Planck continued on until its supply of liquid helium coolant expired, at which time the scientists operating Planck agreed that the scope had reached the end of its operational life.  

Planck will now be moved into a parking orbit around the sun.    The the final deactivation command was sent to Planck on 23 October 2013.

To read more:  Gizmodo  and The Wikipedia

Fantastic Photos From ESA's Mars Express

I just got a heads up about some really spectacular photos from the ESA's Mars Express.   These shots are in truth a mosaic of shots that bring out the Hebes Chasma canyon system that in part is related to the Tharsis system which contains the largest volcano in the solar system Olympus Mons.

Here is the Hebes Chasma photo, but you should do yourself a favor and check out the ESA site

And here is the link to the ESA site that has more pics  and a lot more info.  Check it out HERE

Readying For Comet ISON

 Out in deep space some 6 billion miles from the sun lies an area containing billions of icy bodies.   Every so often one of theses bodies falls out of this area and hurtles sunward. 

In September of 2012 just such an object was discovered by  Artyom Novichonok and Vitali Nevski using a 40 cm-diameter telescope.  Designated comet ISON its  path  will bring it within over 6 hundred thousand miles above the Sun’s  surface on 28 November of 2013.

Both ESA and NASA have  missions that are now planning to observe ISON.  ESA’s Mars Express will be taking photos and analyzing the composition of the comet’s coma for a two week period.   

SOHO, a  joint ESA/NASA mission will observe the comet as it swings around the Sun in November,  to see if the comet survives its close encounter with the sun.

ESA’s Venus Express and Proba-2 will also target ISON during November and December.

December 26 is the best time to observe the comet during its' closest pass to Earth.  Its brightness will be very much reduced however as its close encounter will have burned off substantial amounts of ice and other gasses

ESA to Attempt Deflection of NEO

ESA's AIM

No question about it, we have been fixated as of late on the off chance that some rogue asteroid might be on a collision course with the Earth and humanity is doomed.

I am not going to say that it can't happen just that it is damn unlikely.  

So what does that have to do with the price of beans in China you ask?  In this article in ESA online, discusses a mission to take place in 2022 that would entail impacting a near Earth asteroid with a 600 or so pound space-craft, moving at 14,000 mph, then seeing if there was any measurable change in trajectory.  

The asteroid in question is a 2600 ft. binary asteroid called 65803 Didymos and all though it is not a huge asteroid, by comparison the Tunguska object was only most likely 1/10 as large.   Didymos' binary is a apx. 500 foot object orbiting about 1/2 mile out and that will be the target of the ESA's experiment.  

The mission will be called A.I.D.A. for asteroid impact & deflection assessment, and will consist of two craft - DART for double asteroid redirection test and AIM - asteroid impact monitor.  The impactor will be the DART and AIM will record the data. 

If this all sounds a bit familiar, recall the NASA   Deep Impact mission which launched an impactor into the path of the asteroid Temple 1.    Here is one of the films recorded.

Here is the Dvice article

and the ESA article

Pic of the Insides of Dragon While Docked With the ISS

André Kuipers, a physician with the European Space Agency, aboard the ISS, had a chance to take this photograph while SpaceX's Dragon supply vehicle was docked with the station.

He also wrote,

• Inside of the Dragon module. Beautiful. Spacious, Modern. Blue LEDs. Feels a bit like a sci-fi filmset. Of course it is from Los Angeles.

Yep, even though we have seen it before, there is something about seeing it while it is working. The light DO add to the futuristic feel, don't they.

More in the Boing Boing article

Image of a Supernova Ring

Supernova  1987a

1987AOn February 23, 1987 in the Large Magellanic Cloud a star exploded with enough energy to be seen all the way across the universe. The Super Nova took place in an irregular satellite galaxy of the Milky Way and was photographed recently by the European Space Agency’s Faint Object Camera. The FOC is part of the science platform aboard NASA's Hubble Space Telescope.

The photograph taken by the FOC shows an image of a gaseous ring surrounding the central supernova remnant. Most interesting the photo shows clumps and spaces in the ring. As the article in The Daily Galaxy blog reports that this:

• indicates that the material is not uniformly distributed.

Russian Grunt Update

From the Daily Galaxy Blog:

• The European Space Agency (ESA) announced that they will attempt to contact the stranded Russian Phobos-Grunt spacecraft that became stuck at a low-Earth orbit due to engine failure that followed its launch on November 9.....

One of the problems, according to the blog article is that:

• The Russians could not decipher the information from the ESA’s Australian station
• 
  The telemetry showed that the radio equipment in Phobos was in operational and was exchanging information with the main flight computer and the on-board control system. Observations from Earth have indicated that the orbit of Phobos-Grunt had become more stable

Manfred Warhaut, ESA's Head of Mission Operations at the European Space Operations Center has said that "This could mean that the spacecraft's attitude, or orientation, is also now stable, which could help in regaining contact because we'd be able to predict where its two antennas are pointing,"

More on the ESA's attempt here

Image is of the purposed Phobos landing site of the Grunt probe

"Don Quijote" Tilting At Asteroids Now

Remember the Apophis asteroid? The 1,600-foot-wide near-Earth asteroid which NASA said had a chance of around one in 250,000 of hitting Earth in 2036. Well it seems that ESA's Don Quijote spacecraft is going to take a whack at it in 2015, with the hopes that it can deflect the asteroid.

Don Quijote only weighs in at 1,100 pounds but it will be traveling at six miles a second so there is a chance that it might have a miniscule effect. Me? I would have to say that 250k in 1 against a hit, would be something to leave alone. Even though it is going very fast, the added energy is not going to matter much.

However that has not stopped China from weighing in with the same stunt! A team at Beijing's Tsinghua University, is planning to send a tiny 20-some-pound on a reverse orbit with gravity assist from Earth and smack Apophis doing 200k mph! Check out that story here


Apophis info here