New Mars Express And Huygens Results, ESA conference - November 30, 2005 Options

[Guest_BruceMoomaw_*]

This gives more reason to think that, if MRO fails, they'll delay MSL till 2011 and fly a replacement MRO instead in 2009. However, Nick Appleby told me at AGU that NASA still very much wants to fly MSL on schedule -- it's their current "sacred cow" (to quote the COMPLEX meeting) -- and he also said that if a repeat MRO should be necessary, replacements of some instruments such as CRISM couldn't be built by 2009.

[Guest_AlexBlackwell_*]

This gives more reason to think that, if MRO fails, they'll delay MSL till 2011 and fly a replacement MRO instead in 2009.

Let's hope that doesn't happen, if for no other reason than to spare Dan McCleese et al. from having to build a fourth instrument for his atmospheric investigation. Two PMIRR instruments lost on Mars Observer and Mars Climate Orbiter, with the replacement, an upgraded version called Mars Climate Sounder, now en route aboard MRO.

[Guest_BruceMoomaw_*]

Yes, poor McCleese must be feeling like Sisyphus at this point -- he keeps getting that rock rolled ALMOST all the way to the summit before it rolls all the way back down again.

So far there is absolutely no indication that MRO will fail -- all its major systems have been tried out, and Doug McCuistion said it's working better than any in-flight spacecraft in his experience. (The only slight problem was noise in one of HiRISE's 10 channels, which vanished when it fully warmed up.) But then, Mars Observer worked very well all the way to Mars, too...

[Guest_BruceMoomaw_*]

This proposal includes a relay orbiter and 4 netlander modules (stationary seismic\atmospheric probes with 0.5-1 year mission durations). I've seen no mention of the Netlanders in the current ESA announcements, do we know for certain that they have been canned?

The official plan now is to include exactly ONE Netlander-type payload on the mission -- which will be carried on the same lander as the rover, and then left behind at the landing site. (It will, however, also include heat flow measurements.) See my new entry on the ExoMars thread in the "Past and Future" section.

[JonClarke]

"Becquerel is an interesting spot though, it hosts the infamous "White Rock" deposit..."

Becquerel has a white-rock like deposit, but not "White Rock"  That is located in a crater in Sabeaus Sinus, east of Sinus Meridiani and East of the Schiaparelli Basin.  There are a number of craters in the Oxia Palus region east into Arabia that contain erodable layered deposits.  Henry Crater in Arabia has the largest, there's another smaller one nearby.  The White Rock deposit is much more noticable than the others, as it's in a low albedo region and has high contrast with the dark more or less basaltic sands in those regions.  The others are in intermediate to high albedo regions.

Thanks ed, I stand corrected.

Jon

[tedstryk]

Let's hope that doesn't happen, if for no other reason than to spare Dan McCleese et al. from having to build a fourth instrument for his atmospheric investigation.  Two PMIRR instruments lost on Mars Observer and Mars Climate Orbiter, with the replacement, an upgraded version called Mars Climate Sounder, now en route aboard MRO.

If MRO fails, McCleese might have reason to be paranoid!

[Guest_paulanderson_*]

Another good clay article posted yesterday on Scientific American:

Martian Claymation
An ancient, watery Mars was not always an acid bath

http://www.sciam.com/article.cfm?chanID=sa...35983414B7F0000

Again about the carbonates though, what about the traces that Spirit saw at the beginning of the mission and the trace levels seen globally from orbit, as mentioned in the same MER update from 2004? I posted the link before, would have to find it again now...