Phoenix Lander Update: No Saturday Night Maneuver for Phoenix (Mars landing tomorrow!)

NASA News ^ | 5/24/08

[LibWhacker]

Mission controllers for NASA's Phoenix Mars Lander decided Saturday afternoon, May 24, to forgo the second-to-last opportunity for adjusting the spacecraft's flight path.

Phoenix is so well on course for its Sunday-evening landing on an arctic Martian plain that the team decided it was not necessary to do a trajectory correction 21 hours before landing.

However, the team left open the option of a correction maneuver eight hours before landing, if warranted by updated navigational information expected in the intervening hours.

Sunday at 4:53 p.m. Pacific Time is the first possible time for confirmation that Phoenix has landed. The landing would have happened 15 minutes earlier on Mars, but the radio signals take 15 minutes to travel from Mars to Earth at the distance separating the two planets today.

[LibWhacker]

Okay, everybody... You all know about the peanuts, right?

Stock up now. THAT'S AN ORDER!!! ;-)

[JRandomFreeper]

I have MRE peanuts. I can't eat them without finding my teeth, and I'm not going to put on my glasses to look. But they are here, close. 7 minutes. They can do this. They are smart and good.

/johnny

[Diogenesis]

Ranger 1 U.S.A. Aug 1961 lunar probe launch failure, did not escape Earth orbit, reentered on 8/30/61

Ranger 2 U.S.A. Nov 1961 lunar probe launch failure, did not escape Earth orbit, reentered on 11/20/61

Ranger 3 U.S.A. Jan 1962 lunar landing launch failure, missed the moon by 22,862 mi.

Ranger 4 U.S.A. Apr 1962 lunar landing computer failed, no telemetry received, crashed on the lunar farside

Ranger 5 U.S.A. Oct 1962 lunar landing missed the moon by 450 mi.

Ranger 6 U.S.A. Jan / Feb 1964 lunar photography cameras failed, no data returned, impacted in the Sea of Tranquillity area

Ranger 7 U.S.A. Jul 1964 lunar photography transmitted first close-up photos of the moon, impacted in the Sea of Clouds area

Ranger 8 U.S.A. Feb 1965 lunar photography transmitted high-quality photos of the moon, impacted in the Sea of Tranquillity area

Ranger 9 U.S.A. Mar 1965 lunar photography transmitted high-quality photos of the moon, impacted in the Crater of Alphonsus

[Blood of Tyrants]

This is an extremely complicated maneuver. Basically the spacecraft has to land itself because any commands sent it are minutes away.

[dragnet2]

Great looking animation from JPL showing decent and landing. Pretty incredible stuff.

(The video is only about 2 minutes and gives a nice overview of hopefully what is expected).

http://www2.jpl.nasa.gov/videos/phoenix/640/p

[dragnet2]

This one might even work.

http://www.jpl.nasa.gov/news/phoenix/phx20080327.php

[Lancer_N3502A]

THAT was a damn good video.

[InABunkerUnderSF]

Will there be a live thread?

[LibWhacker]

I was actually in the process of looking for one when I got your question.

And here it is! :-)