At this point in the mission, why not "rasp till ya' drop"....there doesn't seem to be much problem in collecting an ice sample via the rasp...why not run the rasp over the hard ice areas until the scoop is full, hoping that a full scoop will have enough weight to overcome the clumpiness/stickiness of th soil and fall into a collector ??...I realize there is some danger in burning out the rasp motor but at this stage, so what ???

I have to agree with you on this...... I've lirked on this site for ages.....there are some very bright and talented people posting here...frankly a bit too tight for my liking but the only problem I have with that is that some of you "experts" are reluctant to call things the way "Joe Ordinary" would see it.

Who's Joe ?...why, that's me.....an ordinary person who has been following the Space program since the manned Mercury days....that's my credentials...maybe not much but that's all I got..

So why am I disappointed ??...because this was the mission that was going to get a real honest to gooodness taste of Martion H2O...it was there...we could see it viia instruments from Martian orbit but to get a significan sample tested, we need to be on Martian dirt.

Phoenix has accomplished some amazing things but without a significant ice sample and an analysis report showing that H20, something an "ordinary" person following this mission can undertand, I can't call this mission a success....

It's going to be a long time before another lander gets a crack at this soil...with that in mind, the soil/ice capture design should have been over engineered to ensure that any sample would be delivered to the testing instruments under any condition...

Just "Joe Ordinary's" $0.02....

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Loooong time lurker...first post...been wondering about this for a while....Has there been enough analysis done of the Martian "water" to make up a batch of it on Earth ??

Phoenix has "tasted" Martian water...what about us Earthlings ?? Is there eenough data on the water found on Mars to combine the appropriate elements (h2o +++ ??) and would it be safe for humans to actually sample ????