Phoenix rover stranded due to miscommunication
Our nearest neighbor Mars is a cold desert planet with no liquid water on its surface. Mars, like Earth, has two poles, each of which are covered by huge ice caps that remain frozen throughout the year. But in the Martian arctic, frozen water lies just below ground level instead of on the surface as it is here on our planet. Discoveries made by the Mars Odyssey Orbiter in 2002 show large amounts of subsurface water ice in the northern arctic plain.
Recently, a robotic rover called Phoenix (a rover is an unmanned vehicle that moves on the surface of another planet, gathering various samples of terrain and sending pictures back to the satellites orbiting Earth) was sent by NASA (National Aeronautics and Space Administration) was sent to Mars. The Phoenix lander targets this circumpolar (around the pole) region using a robotic arm to dig through the protective top soil layer to the water ice below and, ultimately, to bring both soil and water ice to the lander platform for sophisticated scientific analysis.
The complement of the Phoenix spacecraft and its scientific instruments are ideally suited to uncover clues to the geologic history and biological potential of the Martian arctic. Phoenix will be the first mission to return data from either polar region providing an important contribution to the overall Mars science strategy of, “Follow the Water,” and will be instrumental in achieving the four science goals of NASA’s long-term Mars Exploration Program.
Along with the rover robot Phoenix, a satellite called Odyssey revolved around Mars as a part of the mission to relay the information gathered by Phoenix back to Earth. However, the rover’s foray into Mars has been marred by one glitch or another, either technical or physical.
In the first incident, NASA’s new robotic craft on the red planet had been due to start its real work, after carrying out two practice scoops earlier this week. But the Odyssey satellite orbiting Mars unexpectedly went into “safe mode” and failed to send the instructions. As a result, the information gathered could not be relayed back to Earth.
In the second incident, it was found that a sample was found lying on the screen of the lid covering the tiny oven present in the rover. Expectedly, it resulted in unclear images being sent back to Earth.
