Radio Glitch Delays Activities for Mars Lander

Radio Glitch Delays Activities for Mars Lander
NASA officials say radio glitch on orbiter over Mars delays moving Phoenix lander
By ARTHUR H. ROTSTEIN Associated Press Writer
TUCSON, Ariz. May 27, 2008 (AP)
The Associated Press


NASA couldn't send commands to the Phoenix Mars lander for most of Tuesday because of a radio glitch, delaying a second day of activities, officials said.
Phoenix
This image provided by NASA, JPL-Caltech and the University of Arizona shows a portion of the... Expand
This image provided by NASA, JPL-Caltech and the University of Arizona shows a portion of the Martian landscape seen from the Phoenix Mars Lander after it landed on the planet on Sunday, May 25, 2008. The spacecraft touched down in the northern polar region of the planet after a 422 million-mile flight from Earth. Collapse
(JPL-Caltech, University of Arizona/ NASA/ AP Photo)
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The minor problem was fixed later in the day and the Mars Reconnaissance orbiter resumed relaying the lander's images of the Martian landscape back to Earth, said NASA officials.

Phoenix, the latest spacecraft on Mars, communicates with scientists through two NASA orbiters circling the planet.

The Reconnaissance orbiter earlier had turned its radio off, possibly because of a cosmic ray, said Fuk Li, manager of the Mars exploration program for NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory in Pasadena, Calif.

Li said the orbiter was programmed to respond as it did.

"All this is a one-day hiccup in being able to move the arm around, so it's no big deal," said Ed Sedivy, Phoenix program manager at Lockheed Martin Space Systems Co.


Even with the glitch fixed, SPL spokeswoman Veronica McGregor said the second orbiter, the Mars Odyssey, would be used Wednesday to send commands to Phoenix during its morning orbital pass. It will tell the lander to begin unstowing its robotic arm.

Since landing on Mars on Sunday, Phoenix has delighted scientists with the first-ever peek of the planet's northern arctic region. The terrain where Phoenix settled is relatively flat with polygon-shaped patterns in the ground likely caused by the expansion and contraction of underground ice.

Peter Smith of the University of Arizona, the mission's principal researcher, and his colleague Alfred McEwen, who operates the camera aboard the Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter, said photos taken since the landing show that Phoenix is at the edge of a trough that will make an ideal place for digging.

Smith said plans had called for maneuvers Tuesday to unhook the lander's 8-foot robotic arm from a protective sleeve that held it in place. That movement will be delayed by a day because of the radio outage.

The arm is at the heart of the lander's scientific functions during its three-month experiment.