New Mars Rover 'Curiosity' Harrowing Travel Plan

Rod
Rod
Joined: 3 Jan 06
Posts: 4396
Credit: 811266
RAC: 0
Topic 195740

An Animation of proposed landing, I wish them all the luck in this complex deployment.

Curiosity Mars Landing'

There are some who can live without wild things and some who cannot. - Aldo Leopold

mikey
mikey
Joined: 22 Jan 05
Posts: 11889
Credit: 1828197331
RAC: 202737

New Mars Rover 'Curiosity' Harrowing Travel Plan

Quote:

An Animation of proposed landing, I wish them all the luck in this complex deployment.

Curiosity Mars Landing'

It is cool though!

Matt Giwer
Matt Giwer
Joined: 12 Dec 05
Posts: 144
Credit: 6891649
RAC: 0

RE: An Animation of

Quote:

An Animation of proposed landing, I wish them all the luck in this complex deployment.

Curiosity Mars Landing'

If I were betting on this I would look at the most complex landing evolution ever attempted and look for the best odds I could find for failure. Yeah, not patriotic. The number of steps to get to the surface is not rational.

And it is not just the number of steps. There is lowering it on four cables. If one cable hangs it lays on its side. There are steps within steps that can go wrong.

Bikeman (Heinz-Bernd Eggenstein)
Bikeman (Heinz-...
Moderator
Joined: 28 Aug 06
Posts: 3522
Credit: 686138939
RAC: 552243

Hi! Curiosity won't have

Hi!

Curiosity won't have solar panels but will get power from radioactive decay (RTG). I guess we better hope for a soft landing :-)

CU
HB

telegd
telegd
Joined: 17 Apr 07
Posts: 91
Credit: 10212522
RAC: 0

RE: There is lowering it on

Quote:
There is lowering it on four cables. If one cable hangs it lays on its side. There are steps within steps that can go wrong.


Yup - it all looked great to me until they got to the precise hovering and lowering by cable.

Comment viewing options

Select your preferred way to display the comments and click "Save settings" to activate your changes.