Mars probe landing tonight

[Thai GI]

If they lost this one too (three to many failures), there’s something there they don’t want us to know about… (no inside information just a guess).

Thai GI sends…

[MTI]

Imagine the engineering challenge . . surviving a launch, exiting the gravitational pull of Earth, traversing space, decelerating from 1,200 miles per hour to 0 mph in six minutes, which includes hovering on retro rockets 40-50 feet off the surface, then bouncing in airbags for a few kilometers! Wow.

[Botnst]

MTI, given the truth of your analysis, what are the chances of a safe launch, landing, return launch, return landing of human beings?

If it's 1/3 chance for one-way robots would it be 1/9 for round-trip? I'll bet not. I'll bet the chance of a successful return trip would be much, much lower. The return vehicle must remain viable after decceleration, near-crash landing, then be able to properly re-ignite for the return leg.

There are many people who find the current shuttle failure rate unacceptible. If we improved the failure from the current martian success rate for each leg to say... the shuttle rate (2% catastrophic failure) for a round trip, would it be okay to send manned vessels?

Botnst

[MTI]

As a believer in "the right stuff" a manned landing would have higher rates of success than robotic, but the challenge there is the scale/payload size necessary for manned missions with life support and safety systems. Unmanned vehicles are smaller, have less redundant systems and are, by naturel, expendable. So, for "bang for the buck" unmanned is the way to go for now.

[Paulwho]

The Martian International Public Radio System today announced that the glow in the sky was a weather balloon NOT an unidentified flying object as rumored by the local citizens. All has been reported quiet in the sky in Martian Area 51. Good Luck NASA.

[Botnst]

http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/science/nature/3365371.stm

[sfloriII]

Originally posted by MTI
... exiting the gravitational pull of Earth, traversing space,

Excuse my anal tendency here. I doesn't actually exit the gravitational pull of the Earth as gravity really has no boundaries. I only remember that fact because my astononmy teacher waaay back in school said that Walter Cronkite said a similar statement on the air as he talked over televised shots of our guys taking off for the moon.

[william rogers]

Spock! Are you napping........


William Rogers........

[engatwork]

Wonder if it has any vacuum controls - pun intended.

[mikemover]

Damn, I can't find my foil hat!

Mike

[jhal]

Just caught it on the news, it made it!!! Congrats NASA!