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Curiosity has landed — Parallax Forums

Curiosity has landed

NWCCTVNWCCTV Posts: 3,629
edited 2012-08-18 06:44 in General Discussion
Curiosity has landed with no apparent issues. This is a major accomplishment for all involved, to say the least.

Second Picture:
Nasa_curiousity_first_images_mars.png
Nasa_curiousity_first_images_mars.png
256 x 256 - 47K
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Comments

  • ercoerco Posts: 20,259
    edited 2012-08-05 23:07
    And it's gonna beat you to the garage sales there!
  • Oldbitcollector (Jeff)Oldbitcollector (Jeff) Posts: 8,091
    edited 2012-08-05 23:10
    Azl9hyXCEAE5_Hw.jpg


    First picture!
    Azl9hyXCEAE5_Hw.jpg
    256 x 256 - 16K
  • davejamesdavejames Posts: 4,047
    edited 2012-08-05 23:27
    ...it was very, very cool to watch the NASA streaming TV and experience the landing with all the people that have worked so hard.

    Seeing the 256x256 "thumbnail" picture of Curiosity's shadow on martian soil was...well...very cool!

    :thumb:
  • NWCCTVNWCCTV Posts: 3,629
    edited 2012-08-05 23:28
    erco wrote: »
    And it's gonna beat you to the garage sales there!

    Yep, By 14 minutes I presume!!!
  • Ron CzapalaRon Czapala Posts: 2,418
    edited 2012-08-05 23:29
    Fantastic! What a great achievement.
  • MoskogMoskog Posts: 554
    edited 2012-08-06 00:14
    I woke up this morning and was not sure what to expect. There was so much that could go wrong.
    Such a fantastic feeling hearing the rover had landed and seeing the first pictures coming in.
    I watched the "landing" on both the Internet and CNN International, usually the streaming use to be seconds or minutes delayed, this time the pictures on TV was a second behind the streaming pictures on the Internet.
  • bsnutbsnut Posts: 521
    edited 2012-08-06 02:30
    Ron Czapala wrote: »
    Fantastic! What a great achievement.

    Yes it was. Now we need wait to see what it discovers.
  • Mark_TMark_T Posts: 1,981
    edited 2012-08-06 03:53
    If only they'd been able to send two - one could then film the other sky-craning the rover down to the surface! (and two would mean the risk of total mission failure was reduced). But to pull this off is a major coup in the history of Mars landings !!
  • HumanoidoHumanoido Posts: 5,770
    edited 2012-08-06 04:16
    It's a great achievement and even greater when they find something new again about life on Mars. Since before the time of Percival Lowell and Giovanni Schiaparelli, Mars life has remained an enigmatic controversy. When Curiosity strolls along the dried up ocean bed, I'm sure it cannot resist picking up some sea fossils.
  • skylightskylight Posts: 1,915
    edited 2012-08-06 04:35
    After the seven minutes of wondering whether it would land safely or not, now the anticipation will be to hear those greatly misquoted words "It's life Jim but not as we know it"
  • NWCCTVNWCCTV Posts: 3,629
    edited 2012-08-06 14:01
    The second picture is somewhat reminiscent of when we landed on the moon!!! The "shadow" of the lunar module comes to mind.
  • jazzedjazzed Posts: 11,803
    edited 2012-08-06 14:43
    Last night was so satisfying. Thanks to everyone who made it happen.
  • Oldbitcollector (Jeff)Oldbitcollector (Jeff) Posts: 8,091
    edited 2012-08-06 14:52
    I'm yawning today because I stayed up 2:00am EST, but it was totally worth it.

    NASA has done automated landings, using heat shields, and parachutes before, so the only part I was wondering about was that skycrane part. From the numbers that were reported about 30 minutes later, it looks like everything was SPOT ON.

    Jeff
  • allieallie Posts: 109
    edited 2012-08-07 19:43
    Perfect science, engineering and programming from all involved.
    A great success!
    The discovery channel Canada aired that 500,000 lines of COD3 was run on landing, Awa-some!
    What kind off memory would that take? EEPROM or PROM. I assume a good # of megabytes or gigabytes.
    Hat's off to NASA!

    best regards allie
  • LoopyBytelooseLoopyByteloose Posts: 12,537
    edited 2012-08-08 09:02
    So I've seen mainly two photos in the media - one of a wheel and this other one of the rover's shadow. I find it a bit amusing that we went all the way to Mars and this is the sum total of our photo journalism.

    I know, more will come later - probably a lot more.
  • TorTor Posts: 2,010
    edited 2012-08-08 09:58
    Well.. those photos are from the haz (as in hazard) cameras, the are just navigation tools. The 9 other cameras are not in use yet, except for that picture of the mountain. And that was taken with the lens cover on! It'll bea week before those dust covers will come off. And _then_ we'll see real pictures!<br>
    <br>
    -Tor<br>
    :)
  • HumanoidoHumanoido Posts: 5,770
    edited 2012-08-08 10:12
    More detailed photos are already coming in and the video of the descent is totally fantastic! You can watch everything on the NASA channel through internet. They have both recorded and live feeds.
  • skylightskylight Posts: 1,915
    edited 2012-08-08 10:28
    bsnut wrote: »
    Yes it was. Now we need wait to see what it discovers.
    Hope it doesn't bump into any cats on Mars :innocent:
  • ercoerco Posts: 20,259
    edited 2012-08-08 10:37
    Some backstory on the rover's assembly & testing.
    http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=endscreen&list=UUXRihcrTP6zOcVfd4WfBMqw&v=GY_7d55vJko&NR=1
  • Ron CzapalaRon Czapala Posts: 2,418
    edited 2012-08-08 18:38
    See full resolution image from Curiosity http://www.nasa.gov/mission_pages/msl/multimedia/pia16013.html
  • W9GFOW9GFO Posts: 4,010
    edited 2012-08-08 18:56
    Has anyone come across any 3d models of Curiosity? The only ones I have found you have to pay for.
  • NWCCTVNWCCTV Posts: 3,629
    edited 2012-08-08 22:38
    With all the money that went in to this project you think they could have splurged for a Color camera!!!
  • TorTor Posts: 2,010
    edited 2012-08-09 00:36
    NWCCTV wrote: »
    With all the money that went in to this project you think they could have splurged for a Color camera!!!
    The pictures are from the navigation cameras. No need for color. The real cameras wil come online after a week. One camera (color) has been tested, with its transparent dust cover still on (and dusty).

    -Tor
  • Ron CzapalaRon Czapala Posts: 2,418
    edited 2012-08-09 16:07
    Here is a link to the Image Gallery to view the latest photos http://www.nasa.gov/mission_pages/msl/multimedia/gallery-indexEvents.html
  • lardomlardom Posts: 1,659
    edited 2012-08-10 07:34
    Nasa has a gallery of raw thumbnails which likely means that no image data has been discarded. Raw images can also appear to have no color if you have an application that cannot read raw image data.
  • NWCCTVNWCCTV Posts: 3,629
    edited 2012-08-16 15:59
    NatGeo has a program called Martian Mega Rover. It goes through the entire build, launch and landing. Quite interesting to watch.
  • skylightskylight Posts: 1,915
    edited 2012-08-17 15:23
    Just watched that programme and excellent viewing it was, One part though regarding the decelleration parachute and the worry when it ripped made me wonder that although the entire project was risky from start to finish They were keeping all their eggs in one basket with using just one chute wouldn't it have been safer for multiple smaller ones or maybe just three smaller ones like the apollo missions had when coming back to earth? I know it's just academic now but that one chute was a big big risk
  • W9GFOW9GFO Posts: 4,010
    edited 2012-08-17 15:39
    Three smaller chutes would be less efficient than one large one. That would mean more weight. Also, three times the chance of something going wrong.

    If one of the three failed and the mission could still succeed then it means an even greater increase in weight since one of the chutes wasn't really needed.

    Also, this was a supersonic chute, unlike the ones used in Apollo. It is likely that three chutes would not play well together at those speeds.
  • ercoerco Posts: 20,259
    edited 2012-08-18 00:03
    Video of heatshield hitting Mars: http://news.yahoo.com/video/raw-images-heat-shield-hits-025213741.html?_esi=1
  • sylvie369sylvie369 Posts: 1,622
    edited 2012-08-18 06:44
    Mohawk Guy and Elvis Guy on NPR's Wait, Wait, Don't Tell Me:

    http://www.npr.org/programs/wait-wait-dont-tell-me/
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