Genesis Splat-down - Tilted Forum Project Discussion Community

ObieX · 09-08-2004, 08:25 AM

On NASA Tv, the Genesis craft that was sent to collect solar wind samples goes splat. They were going to catch the chute via helecoptr as it came into the atmosphere so as to prevent damage to the samples. But hte chute didnt open at all and it smashed into the desert. :P

bigoldalphamale · 09-08-2004, 08:28 AM

*golf clap*

outstanding work as usual NASA.

ObieX · 09-08-2004, 08:28 AM

I'd add pictures but i cant seem to take screenshots of the stream from nasa tv, so they'll have to wait

ObieX · 09-08-2004, 08:29 AM

Breaking News :P

Glory's Sun · 09-08-2004, 08:29 AM

whoo hoo another 20 billion up in smoke hehe

ShaniFaye · 09-08-2004, 08:30 AM

http://www.cnn.com/2004/TECH/space/0...cnn/index.html

Quote:

Genesis spacecraft crash-lands in desert
By Michael Coren
CNN
Wednesday, September 8, 2004 Posted: 12:22 PM EDT (1622 GMT)
(CNN) -- The Genesis return capsule crashed into the desert on Wednesday missing a mid-air retrieval that was meant to protect the spacecraft from a potentially damaging impact with the Earth.

"The capsule has suffered extensive damage. It has broken apart on the desert floor," said an official on NASA TV. "Hopefully, there will be enough evidence to see what went wrong. Whether there will be enough science left inside remains to be seen."

Teams are attempting to recover the craft. NASA has warned them that a "live mortar" or explosive charge designed to deploy the chutes may still be armed.

NASA officials at the Jet Propulsion Laboratory in California said that long-range cameras did not detect the parachutes that should have slowed the craft.

"There was no drogue chute or parafoil," said a JPL spokesman. "Under those condition, the Genesis capsule hit the ground at about 100 mph."

NASA officials located the spacecraft around noon on Wednesday after it dug into the desert soil.

It is unclear if any of the scientific instruments or samples were damaged.

The daring trip to study the solar wind streaked home today as the Genesis capsule makes a fiery ride across the skies of Oregon, northeastern Nevada, southwestern Idaho and western Utah.

By 11:55 am EDT, it will reach the roof of the atmosphere, about 410,000 feet, and start glowing like a streaking meteor. The spacecraft will be be retrieved by helicopter above the Utah desert carrying extraterrestrial samples.

"We are bringing a piece of the sun down to Earth," said Charles Elachi, the director of the Jet Propulsion Laboratory in Pasadena, California. "That's going to give us some fundamental understanding of our origins."

Scientists say the data will not only reveal the composition of the sun, but illuminate how our planet could have formed from clouds of stellar dust.

"Four and a half billion years ago, all of the matter of the solar system, including us, was part of a giant molecular cloud," said Don Burnett, principal investigator for the Genesis mission. "Genesis is providing the chemical composition of that solar nebula. ...The material is still stored for us in the surface of the sun."

Two helicopters will be poised above a Utah Air Force base to snag the Genesis spacecraft's return capsule. The sturdy container contains atomic isotopes collected as particles streaming off the sun, known as the solar wind.

The unorthodox midair retrieval will snag the first extraterrestrial samples since the Apollo missions in the 1970s.

Genesis collected the particles over the last two years on special tiles made from silicon, diamond, gold, sapphire and other materials. The solar particles, embedded in the collector tiles, were ejected at about 280 miles per second (450 km/s) from the sun's scorching corona or outer atmosphere.

Genesis will fill in an astronomical blank spot about its makeup.

"What we've been missing is a starting point," says Burnett. "These samples allow precise measurements of the abundance of elements and isotopes in the sun."

Our star accounts for 99 percent of the mass in the solar system. It is composed mostly of isotopes of hydrogen and helium and includes 60 other elements including neon, argon carbon, nitrogen, oxygen and iron.

In all, Genesis has collected the equivalent of a few grains of the material. Scientists say that is enough to keep researchers busy for decades.

"In some cases, we will be studying these one atom at a time," said Burnett who estimates there will be a "billion billion" atoms available for study.

"We'll have a reservoir of solar matter," he said. "We can meet the requirements for (studying ) the solar composition through the 21st century."

Genesis mission
Launched in 2001 from Cape Canaveral, the Genesis spacecraft traveled beyond the protective cloak of Earth's magnetosphere for two years before heading home. Because of Earth's electromagnetic field, much of the sun's deadly radiation and material never reaches the planet's surface.

In April, the craft ejected a 500-pound return capsule for return to Earth.

It has been approaching the planet at a leisurely 600 mph. By the time it reaches Earth's atmosphere, the craft will be racing toward the planet at more than 25,000 mph. It will use a series of parachutes to slow its descent.

On Wednesday, it is expected to enter the atmosphere at 11:55 am ET above Oregon and, just two minutes later, glide down over the Utah desert. The main parachute, a wing-like parafoil, will deploy during its decent and a helicopter will snatch the Genesis capsule when it is still about a mile off the ground.

This daring retrieval method will protect the samples and sensitive instruments during reentry. A crash landing, even at the capsule's relatively slow speed of 9 mph, could ruin some of the data collected during the mission.

The prospects for success look good according to NASA's retrieval partner in the mission, the aerospace firm Vertigo.

"If they can find it, the success rate is very high," said Vertigo official Roy Haggard.

A modified helicopter -- with a winch, hydraulic capture pole and hundreds of feet of line -- will follow the capsule by radar until it moves in and snags the parafoil. Because the Genesis capsule must repressurize in the upper atmosphere, scientists want to minimize the sample's exposure to air and possible contamination.

Once it is secured at a NASA facility, scientists can breathe easier, said Burnett.

"After that we can take our time, and we will see what we have," he said.

ObieX · 09-08-2004, 08:41 AM

netnut · 09-08-2004, 08:55 AM

Total bummer for them. Though I thought is was funny when they held a press conference yesterday and only 10-12 reporters showed up. There were more empty seats that there were people. It looked like they were expecting at least a hundred.

MageB420666 · 09-08-2004, 09:33 AM

Goddamn I wish they would stop screwing up. I can understand if there is a navigation malfuction because the math was off by .00001% or something, but the parachutes not opening is just inexcusable. They spend all the money the get to make some extremely complex craft and then screw it up by missing some stupid little detail. At the rate NASA is going they're gonna lose all funding and I would rather not see that happen.

water_boy1999 · 09-08-2004, 09:41 AM

Comical.

I do find it humorous that with all the brain power flowing over at NASA, that failed chutes is the cause of millions of lost dollars in funding for this particular mission.

Averett · 09-08-2004, 09:50 AM

Reese · 09-08-2004, 10:02 AM

I don't believe that for one second! I can tell that's an Alien Spacecraft! It's Roswell all over again! Can't you see!?

Jonsgirl · 09-08-2004, 10:29 AM

Poor NASA. You'd think they'd be getting better, not worse, at this whole space exploration thing.

guthmund · 09-08-2004, 10:35 AM

You'd think they'd have some sort of back up plan.

Maybe they should have a circus troupe out there with a big net to catch it when it fell.

I guess that wouldn't have been expensive enough for NASA though. Maybe a giant robot with 8 wheels and a big catcher's glove made out of antiquated computers and leftover shuttle parts.

When is someone going to step and rid the world of NASA? Not that we shouldn't be exploring space and so forth, just not with NASA.

World's King · 09-08-2004, 02:56 PM

radioguy · 09-08-2004, 03:15 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by guccilvr

whoo hoo another 20 billion up in smoke hehe

I want to say that it was only $260 million, insert sarcasm.

I wonder what NASA's annual working budget is. It's got to be HUGE!

tecoyah · 09-08-2004, 03:18 PM

What a pisser....could have led to some very useful research.

Fremen · 09-08-2004, 03:25 PM

Quote:

A crash landing, even at the capsule's relatively slow speed of 9 mph, could ruin some of the data collected during the mission.

Sucks to be the designer that botched that deployment.
I wonder how much data and/or particles are left...

(this brought to mind)

"I got it!"
"No!" "I got it!"

adam · 09-08-2004, 04:14 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by guthmund

You'd think they'd have some sort of back up plan.

They had two parachutes... what kind of backup plan were you looking for?

Space missions are risky. This isn't like hooking up your stereo...

gnort · 09-08-2004, 07:44 PM

I blame....KHAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAN!

guthmund · 09-08-2004, 08:30 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by adam

They had two parachutes... what kind of backup plan were you looking for?

Space missions are risky. This isn't like hooking up your stereo...

Wow, two parachutes....

I believed I mentioned a roving circus troupe....eh????

If NASA can help send this laundry list of stupid stuff into space, why not go ahead and send someone up to get the cosmic capsule?

I know they're terrified of a repeat of the recent shuttle tragedy, but eventually they're going to have to find a way back into space. Why not to fetch something they deem so incredibly important?

Surely a mission that spanned 3 years and cost millions of dollars is more important than fertilizing frog eggs, (/cue Star Wars music and give "jazz hands") IN SPACE!!!!

ForgottenKnight · 09-08-2004, 10:29 PM

I don't think it's humorous in the slightest. I was really hopping for it to be a sucessful recovery. Unfortunately that wasn't the result.

Quote:

Originally Posted by Jonsgirl

Poor NASA. You'd think they'd be getting better, not worse, at this whole space exploration thing.

Give NASA back it's funding and they will get better.

Quote:

Originally Posted by guthmund

Wow, two parachutes....

I believed I mentioned a roving circus troupe....eh????

If NASA can help send this laundry list of stupid stuff into space, why not go ahead and send someone up to get the cosmic capsule?

I know they're terrified of a repeat of the recent shuttle tragedy, but eventually they're going to have to find a way back into space. Why not to fetch something they deem so incredibly important?

Surely a mission that spanned 3 years and cost millions of dollars is more important than fertilizing frog eggs, (/cue Star Wars music and give "jazz hands") IN SPACE!!!!

I don't see how lifescience experiments qualify as "stupid stuff." While I agree that we should go up there and do something better, like explore Mars, the lifescience experiments are important as well. The thing is that politicians won't get their heads out of their butts for long enough to know that we could have gone to Mars in the '70 had they gotten just a little more funding. So due to that, we were stuck doing all the lifescience experiements and enduring more budget cutbacks for the past 30 years.

The Phenomenon · 09-08-2004, 10:39 PM

parachutes are not very reliable, parachute jumpers die every year because of malfunction.

And who knows what happened up there? Its possible that something small hit the thing and damaged it just enough to prevent the damn thing from opening.

NASA must be breaking some of your doors because you ar so much smarter than them

mirevolver · 09-08-2004, 10:42 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by The Phenomenon

And who knows what happened up there? Its possible that something small hit the thing and damaged it just enough to prevent the damn thing from opening.

The other thing to keep in mind was it flew pretty close to the sun which means that it was exposed to a hell of a lot of radiation, that could easily affect the control circuitry.

guthmund · 09-09-2004, 05:35 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by ForgottenKnight

I don't see how lifescience experiments qualify as "stupid stuff." While I agree that we should go up there and do something better, like explore Mars, the lifescience experiments are important as well. The thing is that politicians won't get their heads out of their butts for long enough to know that we could have gone to Mars in the '70 had they gotten just a little more funding. So due to that, we were stuck doing all the lifescience experiements and enduring more budget cutbacks for the past 30 years.

I've tried to wrap my head around it and I just can't see how mating frogs in space is beneficial to the human exploration of space. I could maybe see it relating to human reproduction, but if that's the case, why not just use the astronauts themselves. We don't seem to have a problem keeping them up there long enough to find out how it affects their heart, respiratory system and their bones, but balk at observing them have sex (not they have sex, but you have to wonder....).

And no, it's not all NASA's fault, there is a lot of "help" from Washington, but I imagine it's difficult to sell the American people on experiments to study the effects of weightlessness on carp and such.

To be fair the original idea was a little unorthodox. Snag a falling capsule that's returning from space with giant hooks, a stunt team, and helicoptors? Suddenly my roving circus troupe idea doesn't quite so stupid....

It does indeed suck that 3 years and millions of dollars are no down the drain because of something as simple as a faulty parachute, but again, if it was that important that it not touch the ground why not snag it in space? I just find it hard to believe these fellows didn't have some sensor on the capsule to warn if it had been damaged or suspected that the sun might have fried the insides. These guys put satellites in orbit around worlds millions of miles away. These guys are able to forsee problems on alien worlds, in hostile enviroments, with, in most cases, a huge time differential that has to be dealt with and they couldn't find a way to bring this one back intact?

35 years ago these guys put a man on the moon. I'm tired of the mediocrity. I'm a big fan of space and all that jazz, just not a fan of NASA.

DDDDave · 09-09-2004, 05:38 AM

"We are bringing a piece of the sun down to Earth," said Charles Elachi, the director of the Jet Propulsion Laboratory in Pasadena, California. "That's going to give us some fundamental understanding of our origins."

Does this mean we are descendants of cavemen who could not figure out how to open their parachutes????

09-08-2004, 08:25 AM	#1 (permalink)
ObieX Pickles Location: Shirt and Pants (NJ)	Genesis Splat-down On NASA Tv, the Genesis craft that was sent to collect solar wind samples goes splat. They were going to catch the chute via helecoptr as it came into the atmosphere so as to prevent damage to the samples. But hte chute didnt open at all and it smashed into the desert. :P __________________ We Must Dissent.

09-08-2004, 08:28 AM	#3 (permalink)
ObieX Pickles Location: Shirt and Pants (NJ)	I'd add pictures but i cant seem to take screenshots of the stream from nasa tv, so they'll have to wait __________________ We Must Dissent.

09-08-2004, 08:29 AM	#4 (permalink)
ObieX Pickles Location: Shirt and Pants (NJ)	Breaking News :P __________________ We Must Dissent.

09-08-2004, 08:41 AM	#7 (permalink)
ObieX Pickles Location: Shirt and Pants (NJ)	__________________ We Must Dissent.

09-08-2004, 08:55 AM	#8 (permalink)
netnut Upright Location: Soggy NW but Cali born and raised.	Total bummer for them. Though I thought is was funny when they held a press conference yesterday and only 10-12 reporters showed up. There were more empty seats that there were people. It looked like they were expecting at least a hundred. __________________ "What if the Hokey Pokey is really what it's all about..." -- J.B.

09-08-2004, 08:28 AM	#2 (permalink)
bigoldalphamale Loser	golf clap outstanding work as usual NASA.

09-08-2004, 08:29 AM	#5 (permalink)
Glory's Sun Registered User	whoo hoo another 20 billion up in smoke hehe

09-08-2004, 09:33 AM	#9 (permalink)
MageB420666 <Insert wise statement here> Location: Hell if I know	Goddamn I wish they would stop screwing up. I can understand if there is a navigation malfuction because the math was off by .00001% or something, but the parachutes not opening is just inexcusable. They spend all the money the get to make some extremely complex craft and then screw it up by missing some stupid little detail. At the rate NASA is going they're gonna lose all funding and I would rather not see that happen. __________________ Apathy: The best outlook this side of I don't give a damn.

09-08-2004, 09:41 AM	#10 (permalink)
water_boy1999 Fly em straight! Location: Above and Beyond	Comical. I do find it humorous that with all the brain power flowing over at NASA, that failed chutes is the cause of millions of lost dollars in funding for this particular mission. __________________ Doh!!!! -Homer Simpson

09-08-2004, 09:50 AM	#11 (permalink)
Averett Is In Love Location: I'm workin' on it	__________________ Absence is to love what wind is to fire. It extinguishes the small, it enkindles the great.

09-08-2004, 10:02 AM	#12 (permalink)
Reese Delicious	I don't believe that for one second! I can tell that's an Alien Spacecraft! It's Roswell all over again! Can't you see!? __________________ “It is better to be rich and healthy than poor and sick” - Dave Barry

09-08-2004, 10:29 AM	#13 (permalink)
Jonsgirl Semi-Atomic Location: Home.	Poor NASA. You'd think they'd be getting better, not worse, at this whole space exploration thing. __________________ Someday, someone will best me. But it won't be today, and it won't be you.

09-08-2004, 10:35 AM	#14 (permalink)
guthmund big damn hero	You'd think they'd have some sort of back up plan. Maybe they should have a circus troupe out there with a big net to catch it when it fell. I guess that wouldn't have been expensive enough for NASA though. Maybe a giant robot with 8 wheels and a big catcher's glove made out of antiquated computers and leftover shuttle parts. When is someone going to step and rid the world of NASA? Not that we shouldn't be exploring space and so forth, just not with NASA. __________________ No signature. None. Seriously.

09-08-2004, 02:56 PM	#15 (permalink)
World's King Here Location: Denver City Denver	__________________ heavy is the head that wears the crown

09-08-2004, 03:18 PM	#17 (permalink)
tecoyah Illusionary	What a pisser....could have led to some very useful research. __________________ Holding onto anger is like grasping a hot coal with the intent of throwing it at someone else; you are the one who gets burned. - Buddha

09-08-2004, 07:44 PM	#20 (permalink)
gnort Psycho Location: MA	I blame....KHAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAN! __________________ You had me at Qapla'

09-08-2004, 10:39 PM	#23 (permalink)
The Phenomenon Psycho Location: I think my horns are coming out	parachutes are not very reliable, parachute jumpers die every year because of malfunction. And who knows what happened up there? Its possible that something small hit the thing and damaged it just enough to prevent the damn thing from opening. NASA must be breaking some of your doors because you ar so much smarter than them

09-09-2004, 05:38 AM	#26 (permalink)
DDDDave Addict Location: Sarasota	"We are bringing a piece of the sun down to Earth," said Charles Elachi, the director of the Jet Propulsion Laboratory in Pasadena, California. "That's going to give us some fundamental understanding of our origins." Does this mean we are descendants of cavemen who could not figure out how to open their parachutes???? __________________ I am just a simple man trying to make my way in the universe... "Go confidently in the direction of your dreams. Live the life you have imagined." - Thoreau "Nothing great was ever accomplished without enthusiasm" - Emerson