NASA shows Mars that humans can drive a remote control space tank at .01 km/h
- Reference: 1615188005
- News link: https://www.theregister.co.uk/2021/03/08/perserverance_first_mars_drive/
- Source link:
The vehicle went four whole meters forward, turned 150 degrees to the left, then moved another two-and-a-half meters. The entire drive covered a whopping 6.5 m (21.3 feet) across Martian terrain. The journey took about 33 minutes.
[1]
The Register ran that through a calculator and deduces the nuclear powered laser-equipped space tank, aka Perseverance, sped along at the astounding velocity of .01km/h, quite a comedown from the 19,310 km/h (M15.6) at which it entered the red planet’s atmosphere.
In a press release, NASA [2]said :
[3]
The drive served as a mobility test that marks just one of many milestones as team members check out and calibrate every system, subsystem, and instrument on Perseverance. Once the rover begins pursuing its science goals, regular commutes extending 656 feet (200 meters) or more are expected.
Mission team scientists memorialized the touchdown spot by naming it [4]Octavia E. Butler Landing , after the science fiction author.
Although scientific naming of places and objects in the solar system are the job of the International Astronomical Union, its typical for the scientists on projects to give geological features nicknames that often end up being used in scientific papers.
[5]
Perserverance’s tracks on Mars. Click to enlarge
Image: NASA/JPL-Caltech
“Butler’s protagonists embody determination and inventiveness, making her a perfect fit for the Perseverance rover mission and its theme of overcoming challenges,” said Kathryn Stack Morgan, deputy project scientist for Perseverance in NASA’s press release. “Butler inspired and influenced the planetary science community and many beyond, including those typically under-represented in STEM fields.”
Butler was a pioneering Science Fiction author and one of few black women to achieve prominence in the field during the 1970s and 1980s.
Across her career she won all of Science Fiction’s big prizes -her 1984 short story “Bloodchild” won the Hugo, Nebula and Locus Awards.
Her Patternist series explored how mental powers could shape human society, and over its course saw a domineering man defeated by a more pluralist society. The Xeongenesis trilogy offered a first contact story in which human consciousness was treated as fit only to be integrated into an invading society, and Earth treated as little more than a source of interesting DNA.
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Butler was also the first science fiction author to be awarded MacArthur Fellowship, the so-called “genius grants” awarded by the MacArthur Fellowship. The second, NK Jemisin, is also a black woman and received the award in 2020. ®
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[7] https://whitepapers.theregister.com/
...regular commutes extending 656 feet
It must not go too far: [1]xkcd
[1] https://xkcd.com/1504/
Butler's Landing
I have been a Sci-Fi fan for decades but have never come across Octavia Butler's work before, after having a quick read of her Wikipedia page I must remedy that.
After reading the XKCD comic, I hope Perseverance can use its lasers in a defensive capacity.
Nothing there...
Yep, if you look carefully you can see naff all...
Re: Nothing there...
Yeah because you can discern so much scientific value from a picture on a website. You should contact NASA immediately, to offer your investigative prowess. I'm sure they'll be deeply humbled by your insight and curiosity.
Re: Nothing there...
What makes this even more stupid than it first seems is that, even to a completely untrained observer like me, even in this image which I am almost sure doesn't come from one of the science cameras, there is something very interesting there indeed. In the middle distance are two areas of paler ground (the left hand one is only partly visible). Those are the areas where the plumes from the skycrane blew a lot of dust & surface crud away: looking at them will reveal underlying things, and knowing what shape they are, how large, and how much stuff has been blown off them is definitely going to be interesting.
Re: Nothing there...
> there is something very interesting there indeed. In the middle distance are two areas of paler ground (the left hand one is only partly visible). Those are the areas where the plumes from the skycrane blew a lot of dust & surface crud away: looking at them will ...
NASA needs to be very careful as to where they go next. Think about it: two pale circular patches with some tyre tracks leading away from the centre. If they double-back to look at those patches they could easily end up drawing a cock and balls. :-)
Drives like
My mum. But luckily she doesn't have the lasers.