As Viscount Aero noted, the data is being run through a "bafflement" filter, then a spin cycle before being (mumblemumblemumble) released to the press in a form the proverbial "man in the street" can understand. The hard-drive receiving the ice data might crash. The conclusion will be that the ice is on a 17 year hiatus and will return at a later time.4realScience wrote:It does not take me much time to analyze Langmuir probe data: I can see it in a glance. Their instrument is now active; so where is the data stream?
'Welease Wosetta!'
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Re: 'Welease Wosetta!'
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Re: 'Welease Wosetta!'
I suspect that it will just be an unknown failure. The landing is automated so we'll just see the result of it not anchoring and floating into space.viscount aero wrote:When/if (and very likely) they don't encounter the ice, to have the lander anchor to with its "ice anchors," that will be the first "baffling" news from the ESA team They will act as if they are totally stunned at finding little to no ice to anchor to despite prior missions having revealed comets to be mosty dry asteroids.
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Re: 'Welease Wosetta!'
+1000Metryq wrote:As Viscount Aero noted, the data is being run through a "bafflement" filter, then a spin cycle before being (mumblemumblemumble) released to the press in a form the proverbial "man in the street" can understand. The hard-drive receiving the ice data might crash. The conclusion will be that the ice is on a 17 year hiatus and will return at a later time.4realScience wrote:It does not take me much time to analyze Langmuir probe data: I can see it in a glance. Their instrument is now active; so where is the data stream?
They will say that the ice has "retreated" for the summer like it does on Mars
Last edited by viscount aero on Fri Aug 08, 2014 8:50 am, edited 1 time in total.
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Re: 'Welease Wosetta!'
That or what will happen is the probe will successfully tether to the surface--but ESA will downplay ever having mentioned that the lander was designed to anchor to ice.Aardwolf wrote:I suspect that it will just be an unknown failure. The landing is automated so we'll just see the result of it not anchoring and floating into space.viscount aero wrote:When/if (and very likely) they don't encounter the ice, to have the lander anchor to with its "ice anchors," that will be the first "baffling" news from the ESA team They will act as if they are totally stunned at finding little to no ice to anchor to despite prior missions having revealed comets to be mosty dry asteroids.
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Re: 'Welease Wosetta!'
I doubt it can tether. If it is rock, harpoons and ice scews wont be any good.viscount aero wrote:That or what will happen is the probe will successfully tether to the surface--but ESA will downplay ever having mentioned that the lander was designed to anchor to ice.Aardwolf wrote:I suspect that it will just be an unknown failure. The landing is automated so we'll just see the result of it not anchoring and floating into space.viscount aero wrote:When/if (and very likely) they don't encounter the ice, to have the lander anchor to with its "ice anchors," that will be the first "baffling" news from the ESA team They will act as if they are totally stunned at finding little to no ice to anchor to despite prior missions having revealed comets to be mosty dry asteroids.
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Re: 'Welease Wosetta!'
If that is all they designed for the landing gear then that would be astonishingly naive. But that they seriously considered having to possibly anchor into ice with "ice screws" demonstrates how far astronomy has gotten away from factual thinking. The engineers actually believed at the outset that the comet would be a chunk of ice. That's just incredible.Aardwolf wrote:I doubt it can tether. If it is rock, harpoons and ice scews wont be any good.viscount aero wrote:That or what will happen is the probe will successfully tether to the surface--but ESA will downplay ever having mentioned that the lander was designed to anchor to ice.Aardwolf wrote:I suspect that it will just be an unknown failure. The landing is automated so we'll just see the result of it not anchoring and floating into space.viscount aero wrote:When/if (and very likely) they don't encounter the ice, to have the lander anchor to with its "ice anchors," that will be the first "baffling" news from the ESA team They will act as if they are totally stunned at finding little to no ice to anchor to despite prior missions having revealed comets to be mosty dry asteroids.
Certainly if they find ice and firmly anchor to it then I'm the idiot of the century But I doubt they will find it. From prior missions to comets the probes discovered, virtually unwaveringly, the surfaces to be dry powdery dirt and rock with the volatiles in the tail being chemically created as the comet impinges the solar wind. Any ice that was found was sporadic and inconsistent on the surface.
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Re: 'Welease Wosetta!'
Here is a recent CNN article about Rosetta. Read it and find the telltale fantasy beliefs that the astronomer is assuming to be factual--from the casual use of the word "icy" to assuming the comet is an ancient being who will reveal all planetary formation processes as it was born in the icy reaches of the ancient outer solar system-- a belief already long ago contradicted by the Stardust mission. What's more, he caps it off with the notion that comets have possibly seeded the Earth's oceans--an unbelievable, ridiculous, and untenable theory:
entire article from: http://www.cnn.com/2014/08/08/opinion/b ... index.html
Why Rosetta spacecraft chased after a comet
By Jim Bell
updated 11:43 AM EDT, Fri August 8, 2014
Editor's note: Jim Bell is an astronomer and planetary scientist in the School of Earth and Space Exploration at Arizona State University. He is president of The Planetary Society and author of "Postcards from Mars," "The Space Book" and most recently, "The Interstellar Age," due out in early 2015. The opinions expressed in this commentary are solely those of the author.
(CNN) -- More than 200 years ago, part of a stone tablet was discovered in Egypt that provided the first reliable way to translate ancient hieroglyphics into a modern language. The Rosetta Stone, as the tablet is called, proved to be the key to unlocking details of the rise and fall of civilizations that flourished on our planet many thousands of years ago.
More recently, a space mission bearing the name Rosetta has begun its quest of unlocking details of the rise and fall of entire planets, including the only one we know that is a safe haven for life.
The European Space Agency's Rosetta mission is a robotic spacecraft designed to get up close and personal with the nucleus of a comet. The comet is called 67P/C-G (short for Churyumov--Gerasimenko, the astrophysicists who discovered it in 1969), and it orbits the sun on a 6½ year elliptical path that takes it from just beyond the orbit of Jupiter to just outside the orbit of Earth.
Rosetta: CNN special coverage
But that orbit is relatively new. 67P/C-G is thought to have originated from much farther away, but one or more close passes by Jupiter altered its orbit, pushing it closer in to the Sun. Thus, 67P/C-G may very well be a piece of primordial, icy debris left over from the original formation of our solar system more than 4½ billion years ago.
It's the Rosetta mission team's job to find out if that is indeed the case, and if there is a specific connection between small, icy bodies like this one and the larger terrestrial planets that they have helped build over the course of solar system history.
Launched a decade ago, the spacecraft -- like the comet it was designed to encounter -- was sent on a long, slow, looping trajectory, passing back by Earth and even Mars for gravity assists, and flying past main belt asteroids Steins and Lutetia along the way.
Rosetta spacecraft first to orbit a comet
Rosetta closing in on comet
Could Rosetta unlock Earth's secrets?
In fact, the cruise to 67P/C-G was so long, and so slow, that the spacecraft was actually put into a state of robotic hibernation for nearly three years to help save money. In a great demonstration of both outstanding engineering and phenomenal patience, scientists and engineers returning to the project this past January were ecstatic when the spacecraft woke successfully from its long interplanetary slumber.
Rosetta team members, including a number of NASA-funded U.S. engineers and planetary scientists, were ecstatic again this week as their plucky little robot successfully nuzzled up to the 2½ mile wide nucleus of 67P/C-G to become the first spacecraft to go into orbit around a comet.
"Nuzzled" is an appropriate word, because with a gravity field more than 10,000 times weaker than Earth's, the pull of this tiny comet is only barely felt by the spacecraft. And not only is it tiny, but it seems to also be just plain weird!
Early Rosetta images show the comet looks like a strange, lumpy, double-lobed peanut covered by cliffs, circular ridges and smooth plains. The "neck" between the two main lobes looks almost fragile from certain angles, suggesting the comet might be about to break into two large chunks. That might perhaps not be a surprising fate, as this small icy world is steadily evaporating, jetting huge amounts of dust, water vapor and other gases into space as it basks in the warmth of the sun.
But the best is still yet to come for Rosetta. The mission's dozen science instruments have only just started to characterize the comet in detail, providing chemical, mineral and geologic clues about its origin and evolution.
In November, the team will attempt to set the oven-sized Philae lander (named after another important Egyptian hieroglyph artifact) down onto the comet to make even more precise direct measurements of the surface. It will be a daring, slow-motion adventure, shared with the world, as Philae descends and then struggles to hang on to the surface under the ultra-weak gravity.
Is this small icy body the kind of world responsible for delivering oceans' worth of water to our planet and others? Are the kinds of organic molecules that Rosetta and Philae might find there the kinds of materials that could help seed a planet like ours for life? What kinds of spectacular sights await as the spacecraft follows the comet even closer to the sun, where the surface is predicted to become even more active?
67P/C-G's planetary hieroglyphics are waiting to be deciphered, and I can't wait to find out what they say!
entire article from: http://www.cnn.com/2014/08/08/opinion/b ... index.html
Why Rosetta spacecraft chased after a comet
By Jim Bell
updated 11:43 AM EDT, Fri August 8, 2014
Editor's note: Jim Bell is an astronomer and planetary scientist in the School of Earth and Space Exploration at Arizona State University. He is president of The Planetary Society and author of "Postcards from Mars," "The Space Book" and most recently, "The Interstellar Age," due out in early 2015. The opinions expressed in this commentary are solely those of the author.
(CNN) -- More than 200 years ago, part of a stone tablet was discovered in Egypt that provided the first reliable way to translate ancient hieroglyphics into a modern language. The Rosetta Stone, as the tablet is called, proved to be the key to unlocking details of the rise and fall of civilizations that flourished on our planet many thousands of years ago.
More recently, a space mission bearing the name Rosetta has begun its quest of unlocking details of the rise and fall of entire planets, including the only one we know that is a safe haven for life.
The European Space Agency's Rosetta mission is a robotic spacecraft designed to get up close and personal with the nucleus of a comet. The comet is called 67P/C-G (short for Churyumov--Gerasimenko, the astrophysicists who discovered it in 1969), and it orbits the sun on a 6½ year elliptical path that takes it from just beyond the orbit of Jupiter to just outside the orbit of Earth.
Rosetta: CNN special coverage
But that orbit is relatively new. 67P/C-G is thought to have originated from much farther away, but one or more close passes by Jupiter altered its orbit, pushing it closer in to the Sun. Thus, 67P/C-G may very well be a piece of primordial, icy debris left over from the original formation of our solar system more than 4½ billion years ago.
It's the Rosetta mission team's job to find out if that is indeed the case, and if there is a specific connection between small, icy bodies like this one and the larger terrestrial planets that they have helped build over the course of solar system history.
Launched a decade ago, the spacecraft -- like the comet it was designed to encounter -- was sent on a long, slow, looping trajectory, passing back by Earth and even Mars for gravity assists, and flying past main belt asteroids Steins and Lutetia along the way.
Rosetta spacecraft first to orbit a comet
Rosetta closing in on comet
Could Rosetta unlock Earth's secrets?
In fact, the cruise to 67P/C-G was so long, and so slow, that the spacecraft was actually put into a state of robotic hibernation for nearly three years to help save money. In a great demonstration of both outstanding engineering and phenomenal patience, scientists and engineers returning to the project this past January were ecstatic when the spacecraft woke successfully from its long interplanetary slumber.
Rosetta team members, including a number of NASA-funded U.S. engineers and planetary scientists, were ecstatic again this week as their plucky little robot successfully nuzzled up to the 2½ mile wide nucleus of 67P/C-G to become the first spacecraft to go into orbit around a comet.
"Nuzzled" is an appropriate word, because with a gravity field more than 10,000 times weaker than Earth's, the pull of this tiny comet is only barely felt by the spacecraft. And not only is it tiny, but it seems to also be just plain weird!
Early Rosetta images show the comet looks like a strange, lumpy, double-lobed peanut covered by cliffs, circular ridges and smooth plains. The "neck" between the two main lobes looks almost fragile from certain angles, suggesting the comet might be about to break into two large chunks. That might perhaps not be a surprising fate, as this small icy world is steadily evaporating, jetting huge amounts of dust, water vapor and other gases into space as it basks in the warmth of the sun.
But the best is still yet to come for Rosetta. The mission's dozen science instruments have only just started to characterize the comet in detail, providing chemical, mineral and geologic clues about its origin and evolution.
In November, the team will attempt to set the oven-sized Philae lander (named after another important Egyptian hieroglyph artifact) down onto the comet to make even more precise direct measurements of the surface. It will be a daring, slow-motion adventure, shared with the world, as Philae descends and then struggles to hang on to the surface under the ultra-weak gravity.
Is this small icy body the kind of world responsible for delivering oceans' worth of water to our planet and others? Are the kinds of organic molecules that Rosetta and Philae might find there the kinds of materials that could help seed a planet like ours for life? What kinds of spectacular sights await as the spacecraft follows the comet even closer to the sun, where the surface is predicted to become even more active?
67P/C-G's planetary hieroglyphics are waiting to be deciphered, and I can't wait to find out what they say!
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Re: 'Welease Wosetta!'
They don't have much choice really. If they considered it to be rock then the projectile and firing mechanism required would rule out the entire mission. The harpoon weighs 100g (about the weight of an iphone) and will be fired at only 130mph. Barely enough to penetrate wood. It would struggle in solid ice. They're banking on a loose mix. To penetrate rock they would need something much heavier and faster.viscount aero wrote:If that is all they designed for the landing gear then that would be astonishingly naive. But that they seriously considered having to possibly anchor into ice with "ice screws" demonstrates how far astronomy has gotten away from factual thinking. The engineers actually believed at the outset that the comet would be a chunk of ice. That's just incredible.
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Re: 'Welease Wosetta!'
Then why have press releases mentioned ice screws or anchors if the harpoon can't penetrate ice? To my knowledge the regolith on cometary surfaces is more like the Moon, loose dirt and powder.Aardwolf wrote:They don't have much choice really. If they considered it to be rock then the projectile and firing mechanism required would rule out the entire mission. The harpoon weighs 100g (about the weight of an iphone) and will be fired at only 130mph. Barely enough to penetrate wood. It would struggle in solid ice. They're banking on a loose mix. To penetrate rock they would need something much heavier and faster.viscount aero wrote:If that is all they designed for the landing gear then that would be astonishingly naive. But that they seriously considered having to possibly anchor into ice with "ice screws" demonstrates how far astronomy has gotten away from factual thinking. The engineers actually believed at the outset that the comet would be a chunk of ice. That's just incredible.
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Re: 'Welease Wosetta!'
Harpoons? Maybe we'll all be surprised and the comet will pop like a balloon, then twirl away into space, farting like a whoopie cushion.Aardwolf wrote:I doubt it can tether. If it is rock, harpoons and ice scews wont be any good.
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Re: 'Welease Wosetta!'
Metryq wrote:Harpoons? Maybe we'll all be surprised and the comet will pop like a balloon, then twirl away into space, farting like a whoopie cushion.Aardwolf wrote:I doubt it can tether. If it is rock, harpoons and ice scews wont be any good.
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Re: 'Welease Wosetta!'
That's what they hope. Not sure what regolith thickness can be expected on a 2 mile comet with virtually no gravitational pull.viscount aero wrote:Then why have press releases mentioned ice screws or anchors if the harpoon can't penetrate ice? To my knowledge the regolith on cometary surfaces is more like the Moon, loose dirt and powder.Aardwolf wrote:They don't have much choice really. If they considered it to be rock then the projectile and firing mechanism required would rule out the entire mission. The harpoon weighs 100g (about the weight of an iphone) and will be fired at only 130mph. Barely enough to penetrate wood. It would struggle in solid ice. They're banking on a loose mix. To penetrate rock they would need something much heavier and faster.viscount aero wrote:If that is all they designed for the landing gear then that would be astonishingly naive. But that they seriously considered having to possibly anchor into ice with "ice screws" demonstrates how far astronomy has gotten away from factual thinking. The engineers actually believed at the outset that the comet would be a chunk of ice. That's just incredible.
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Re: 'Welease Wosetta!'
Which mission slammed the impactor into the comet? I forget now. Whatever it was, the result was just rock and dirt ejecta to my recollection. There was no ice in significant quantity detected; she was dry.Aardwolf wrote:That's what they hope. Not sure what regolith thickness can be expected on a 2 mile comet with virtually no gravitational pull.viscount aero wrote:Then why have press releases mentioned ice screws or anchors if the harpoon can't penetrate ice? To my knowledge the regolith on cometary surfaces is more like the Moon, loose dirt and powder.Aardwolf wrote:They don't have much choice really. If they considered it to be rock then the projectile and firing mechanism required would rule out the entire mission. The harpoon weighs 100g (about the weight of an iphone) and will be fired at only 130mph. Barely enough to penetrate wood. It would struggle in solid ice. They're banking on a loose mix. To penetrate rock they would need something much heavier and faster.viscount aero wrote:If that is all they designed for the landing gear then that would be astonishingly naive. But that they seriously considered having to possibly anchor into ice with "ice screws" demonstrates how far astronomy has gotten away from factual thinking. The engineers actually believed at the outset that the comet would be a chunk of ice. That's just incredible.
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Re: 'Welease Wosetta!'
TempelWhich mission slammed the impactor into the comet? I forget now. Whatever it was, the result was just rock and dirt ejecta to my recollection. There was no ice in significant quantity detected; she was dry.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wn_HqbMmn-4
Electric Comet ... awesome
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=34wtt2EUToo
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Re: 'Welease Wosetta!'
Thank you, kiwi. I am watching the Deep Impact movie again. And what does it reveal? That the Rosetta team has apparently learned NOTHING from prior comet missions--nothing! Are they in a coma? Why are we still hearing astronomers and engineers speak of ices, snows, "vents", and water? The ignorance is profound and unbelievable. I will now resume the movie....kiwi wrote:TempelWhich mission slammed the impactor into the comet? I forget now. Whatever it was, the result was just rock and dirt ejecta to my recollection. There was no ice in significant quantity detected; she was dry.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wn_HqbMmn-4
Electric Comet ... awesome
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=34wtt2EUToo
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