ExoMars - Schiaparelli landing Options

[xflare]

Either the shock wave or the thrusters should have created a darkish and less saturated patch of less surface dust on the ground, which should simplify the search in HiRISE images, if taken within the next days/sols.

Here is Mars Global Surveyor's first images of the Opportunity landing site in 2004 http://www.msss.com/mars_images/moc/2004/02/09/ Merdiani is very flat and has few features, I think it might be easier to find than other missing landers with MRO.

Also , here are the impact sites of the 75kg tungsten balance weights from Curiosity, which were very clearly seen in the MRO context camera images. https://www.nasa.gov/mission_pages/MRO/mult...a/pia16456.html Schiaparelli weighs about 500kg.

[climber]

Let see if it enters the category of multiple landings as Phylae. It's possible that it had still some horizontal velocity when hiting the ground. MRO will tell

[katodomo]

Question: Schiaparelli carried INRRI, a laser retroreflector. Would any current or planned near-future orbiter actually have come with a laser that could have used this within the next decade or so?

(i assume that dust storms would have made INRRI unusable relatively fast in comparison to units placed on the moon almost five decades ago)

[Phil Stooke]

Not sure, but they would take that into account in the design. And there is talk of one being added to Insight as well. Something must be intended but I'm not sure of all the details. I have seen talk of laser reflectors before, and it's possible that a network of them would be built up over time, perhaps allowing very accurate rotation data to be collected to monitor precession (for instance).

[nprev]

MOD NOTE: Two posts set invisible for inciting (and responding to) a debate re the 'success' of this mission-- see rule 2.6.

We're not doing that.

[alan]

ESA promised to continue attempts to communicate with the lander in the coming days using available orbiters and to make an effort to locate the lander or its remnants on the surface of Mars.

Sure enough, by October 21, NASA's sharp-eyed Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter, MRO, imaged the wreckage of the Schiaparelli on the surface of Mars exactly at the center of a planned landing ellipse. In the meantime, ESA engineers suspected that the GNS software had been a likely culprit in the failure, commanding the premature cutoff of the propulsion system, which led to a catastrophic crash.

http://russianspaceweb.com/exomars2016-edm-landing.html#mro

Found this via https://twitter.com/cosmos4u/status/789484298143408128

[tedstryk]

It appears that they may recover the data from AMELIA (the descent instruments). So they might learn something about the atmosphere, and they will certainly have some info about the technology. Not a success, but not a total failure either. Seems Mars-6 (sent back atmospheric data during descent, then crashed) would be a better comparison than Mars 3 (20 seconds of useless signal).

[xflare]

http://russianspaceweb.com/exomars2016-edm-landing.html#mro

Found this via https://twitter.com/cosmos4u/status/789484298143408128

Im guessing this would be in a COntext Camera Image.... all the Curiosity EDL hardware is visible in it too.

[Explorer1]

Yes, its a CTX image; low res, but that settles it... http://www.esa.int/Our_Activities/Space_Sc...li_landing_site

HiRISE images next week.

[JRehling]

This is an extreme "cup half full" interpretation, but the chance to observe impacts of known mass and velocity helps very much to interpret the natural impacts which are regularly observed on Mars, the mass and velocity of which are unknown. So, while this outcome was not desired, there is a benefit. The operational failure is a disappointment, but scientifically, the observation of this impact partially offsets the few days' of surface operations that were lost.

[nogal]

There were repeated remarks that the landing would be attempted during the dust season, a first. So how much dusty was the atmosphere at the landing area? Is there any data from Opportunity? And how could it have influenced the EDL?
Fernando

[Explorer1]

Yes, that's a good point JHReling. I seem to recall the HiRISE images of Curiosity's tungsten counterweights and interplanetary cruise stage impacts were useful in that regard. Saving the AMELIA data is also another bit of silver lining to this cloud.

Small consolation to the rest of the team though; they must be going through something none of us laypersons can imagine. Even I'm having mixed feelings about seeing the high res images next week...

[Habukaz]

There were repeated remarks that the landing would be attempted during the dust season, a first. So how much dusty was the atmosphere at the landing area? Is there any data from Opportunity? And how could it have influenced the EDL?
Fernando

There is currently a significant amount of dust in the Martian atmosphere, at least. Apparently, weather radars are capable of picking up dust storms on Earth, and rain can reduce the performance of radar altimeters. Whether a radar altimeter with poor software or performance could get thrown off by the current amount of dust in the Martian atmosphere is to me an interesting question (and whether Mars' dryness would be relevant here).

EDIT: it's not the altimeter, apparently

[alan]

53 km's from Oppy, I bet she could reach it.

[fredk]

So how much dusty was the atmosphere at the landing area? Is there any data from Opportunity?

Lemmon posts very regular tau measurements here. Tau has climbed from its winter low, but at ~0.9 is on the low side compared with previous years.