Sunday, May 25, 2008

Mars Landing



This photo, entitled 'So Few Rocks' , is Doug Ellison's interpretation of the Phoenix spacecraft's landing site on the flat northern Martian plain named Vastitas Borealis.

Phoenix has traveled 422 million miles over nearly 10 months and is set to land on Mars today. NASA refers to the period of hyper-deceleration and descent ''the scariest seven minutes of the mission''.

NASA has not had a successful soft landing in more than three decades since the twin Viking landers in 1976. So cross your fingers.

Be sure to click on the photo. It really does look like the Martian landscape.

13 comments:

WomanHonorThyself said...

fingers crossed Cube!.Blessed Memorial Day to you and yours! :)

cube said...

Ditto to you & yours, Angel. Hope your Memorial weekend is a good one.

Odds of less than 50% are not that good, but mayhaps Phoenix will prove the stats wrong.

Unknown said...

So? Did it land successfully? Fingers crossed, wood knocked on, salt tossed over shoulder.

cube said...

e. peevie: It's about 8 minutes away. I'll let you know.

cube said...

The Phoenix landed at approximately 7:54 PM EST.

Yay!!!

Unknown said...

Yay! Thanks for keeping me up-to-date on inter-planetary happenings.

cube said...

e.peevie: Glad to help.

Caz said...

"It really does look like the Martian landscape."

Oh good.

Not a sound stage on the back lots of Hollywood?

*Phew*

Nice landing, 'ey?

cube said...

caz: The photo was the contest winning shot that would most evoke the landing site on Mars. I thought it was hauntingly beautiful.

About the landing, I heard a NASA person call it about the best landing it could've been. I love it when the scientists get it right.

birdwoman said...

will the aliens like it if we bother them on mars?

So, we were watching the "crystal skull" special on SciFi last weekend... did you happen to catch it? If you didn't, try... it's priceless (did you know that we found a robot head on the moon, but left it there?!)

(*)>

cube said...

bw: Time will tell.

I haven't seen the crystal skull "special". A robot head on the moon? It sounds goofy to me.

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