OK -- I know this is probably The Stupid Question of the Year, but here goes...

Sojourner was programmed to circle its lander indefinitely if it lost contact. We know that the Pathfinder lander lost its batteries and died after about 90 sols, but, if I recall correctly, Sojourner had not shown any indications of failure up to that point.

I know it's *extremely* unlikely, but there is a *very* tiny chance that Sojourner is still waking up every morning, looking for a signal from Sagan Memorial Station, and failing to get one, is continuing its endless circle.

So, here is the really stupid question -- will MTO have the ability to pick up signals from Sojourner, and/or send it commands as if they had been sent from the Pathfinder lander? I know that wouldn't be part of its design -- but would it have the capability?

I guess I still remember Steve Squyres saying, back in '97, that he wanted to take Sojourner and head off to the Twin Peaks...

-the other Doug

I think its batteries died a long time ago...

But maybe MRO will be able to see how far it went after the lander died.

If it has been circling these 8 years, perhaps it has worn down a nice trench all around the lander. All we need is a good steady rain for a few days to turn it into a moat!

Its batteries died quite a while before contact was lost. It was (is?) capable of running on solar power alone, and it did so for quite some time.

Theres nothing that MRO brings to the equation that MEX and Odyssey couldnt have done - but no attempts have been made by either of those iirc

Doug

I was speaking of MTO, not MRO, Doug -- but I'm sure you're right.

Let's see, MRO will be able to resolve (barely) Sojourner, right? All we have to do is take several pictures of the Pathfinder site on different days, and see if it's in the same position each time (as I imagine the odds are overwhelming it will be).

If it isn't, then I imagine there would be a scramble to see if they could pick up Sojourner's radio signal from orbit...

-the other Doug

Sojourner used an off-the-shelf commercial radio modem system for communication with Pathfinder. Certainly the communication protocals have no relation to those of late landers/rovers, but also, I presume, the frequency band was different. And the transmitted signal level was quite low compared with Polar lander and the MER rovers.

Some Mars researcher -- can't remember who -- did say that he hopes MRO will image Pathfinder, to see just how much of a circular racetrack Sojourner carved around the lander while it was waiting futilely for Daddy to wake up again and say something.

......whats amazing is that Sojourner apparently outlived the lander.

Yup - Sojourner was still functioning ( as a solar powered spacecraft only by that time ) and infact plans for long drives away from the lander were being made, when Pathfinder coughed, spluttered and died.

I very much doubt that Soj is still healthy today, but how much driving it actuall did after Pathfinder died has been a fascination I've held for the last 8 years.

Doug

It would be great to see Sojourner in MRO images, but it is very difficult to be confident of the identity of an object near the size of a single pixel in an image. I know color may help, but it will still be a challenge.


Phil

Don't know how many of you watched the TV show "Star Trek: Enterprise" ... In its final episode last month, there was a 5-second throwaway scene of one of Enterprise's shuttlepods flying low over the Martian surface, passing over a plaque reading "Carl Sagan Memorial Station" with a very dust-covered Pathfinder lander sitting next to it.

I would be surprised that it would still be there in that scenario ... Sojourner would probably be locked inside somebody's storage case (unless some museum has it). I cannot see any of the early landers staying where they are, they would either go to a museum, or be stolen.

Bill

In the film Red Mars, MP and Sojourner played a role in the remaining astronaut's rescue, though they assumed the rover had direct link to space capabilities.

They busted it up a bit using it, though. Not as badly as Pioneer 10 was treated by the Klingons in the awful Star Trek 5.

I was also rather impressed overall with their depiction of a (failed) Soviet Mars Sample Return Mission.

Red Mars was not the greatest film, but it was still better than Mission to Mars (oy) - which was STILL better than Armageddon (double oy!).

I almost cried when they ripped sojourner apart in that film. Fortunately, I was brought back to hails of derasive laughter when a mars sample return spacecraft has a colour GUi with a bear on it

Doug

I think that was the "cute" bear the Soviets used as their symbol for the 1980 Moscow Olympics.

For myself, I always thought "Mission to Mars" was a very good film, intelligent science fiction, and "Red Mars" (was that really it's name? -- the one with Val Kilmer, anyway) was a pretty dismal film.

Val Kilmer playing Colonel "King" Kong on a Soviet sample return booster that was *never* intended to carry more than a few ounces of rock just can't compare to Jerry McConnell telling the crew fleeing back to their ship that he had "left for Earth... FIVE... MINUTES... AGO... Please leave a message!"

-the other Doug

Yes, but you must admit it does look like something the Soviets would build:

http://www.sciflicks.com/red_planet/images..._planet_18.html

It kinda looks like the proposed Phobos mission.

How about lists and discussions of the treatment of space probes, real and kinda real, in TV and films?

I will start:

Voyager in Star Trek: The Motion Picture (1979) and Starman (1984).

There was a film from the early 1960s (Angry Red Planet?) about a manned Mars expedition that was searching for a lander that had touched down at the Martian pole before them which they needed for their survival. I seem to recall from decades ago that at least one of the astronauts was pretty upset when the lander turned out not to be useful to them.

And I also dimly recall that the lander looked a lot like this design of a manned Mars lander:

http://www.marsinstitute.info/rd/faculty/d...e/rtr/ma05.html

I know for a fact it is not Robinson Crusoe on Mars that I am thinking of.

Was also mentioned in the Simpsons episode "22 short films about Springfield" and seen in two Futurama epsodes, as well as being the subject of a comedy sketch in "The Armando Iannucci Shows" [2001].

Sojourner was in a Simpsons episode - Bart used her as a skateboard

Doug

I think the film you're remembering is "The Wizard of Mars". I saw it a bazillion years ago, and then rented it a few years ago. I still found it bizarrely compelling. There's something about a certain kind of grade-Z sci-fi that, however silly and kitschy it may be, really puts the hooks in my brain.


Yet another one that really put the hooks into me.

I'd really love to see a film that does the hardship/near-disaster space exploration scenario right, without resorting to the absurdly improbable.