Mariner 4

Credit: NASA

The early 1960s saw a considerable amount of activity - and failure - in the first attempts to send a spacecraft to Mars. In October 1960, the Soviet Union launched two spacecraft, Marsnik 1 and 2, both of which failed when their third stage pumps failed to develop enough thrust to start ignition. The two spacecraft reached an altitude of about 120 km before re-entering the Earth's atmosphere. In 1962, the USSR launched three spacecraft, Sputnik 22, Mars 1 and Sputnik 24, all of which also failed, although Mars 1 was able to transmit some data back to earth for a little over 4.5 months before going silent.

In 1964, the USSR launched Zond 1964A and the US sent their first Mars mission, Mariner 3, both of which also failed. (Mariner 1 and Mariner 2 were missions to Venus, not to Mars.) Twenty-three days after Mariner 3 was launched, Mariner 4 lifted off.

Like Mariner 3, Mariner 4's mission was to fly past Mars and send back scientific observations back to Earth. In addition to a TV camera, Mariner 4 also carried a number of other instruments, including a helium magnetometer, dust detector, and a cosmic-ray telescope. It was the TV camera, however, which caused the biggest stir. The camera took a total of 22 pictures (21 complete pictures and one partial picture made up of 21 lines). The camera showed a barren, cratered landscape, driving home the last nail in the coffin for the fantasy of intelligent life on Mars.

The above image is the 11th photograph of the 22 taken by Mariner 4, and is considered to be one of the best images from that spacecraft. The crater was named "Mariner," after the Mariner 4 probe. Mariner has a diameter of 151 km, and is located at 35 South, 164 West. Running from the lower left corner of the frame through the bottom of the crater is a linear ridge which is part of Sirenum Fossae. The image was taken from 12,600 km and covers 250 km by 254 km. North is up.

Mariner 4 was not expected to survive much longer than the eight months it took to reach Mars; however, the spacecraft actually lasted about three years in solar orbit, continuing long-term studies of the solar wind environment and making coordinated measurements with Mariner 5, a sister ship launched to Venus in 1967.

Oliver Morton on Giovanni Schiaparelli

Giovanni Schiaparelli's Map of Mars (1877)

Schiaparelli was not interested in celebrating his peers and forebears; he wanted to give Mars the high cultural tone of the classics. ... To the west were the lands beyond the pillars of Hercules, such as Tharsis, an Iberian source of silver mentioned by Herodotus, and Elysium, the home of the blessed at the far end of the Earth. Beneath them, part of the complex dark girdle strung around Mars below its equator, were the sea of sirens, Mare Sirenum, and Mare Cimmerium, the sea that Homer put next to Hades, "wrapped in mist and cloud." Then we come to the Mediterranean regions: the Tyrrhenian Sea and the Gulf of Sidra (Syrtis Major, the long-observed hourglass) dividing bright Hellas and Arabia. Along the far side of Arabia sits the Sinus Sabeus, a gulf on the fragrant coast of Araby, home to the Queen of Sheba. Beyond Arabia begins the Orient, with Margaritifer Sinus, the bay of pearls on the southern coast of India, and the striking bright lands of Argyre (Burma) and Chryse (Thailand). Finally, in the dark region others had called the eye of Mars, Schiaparelli placed Solis Lacus, the lake of the sun, from which all dawns begin.

Do not think for a moment that this means a good classical education will help you find your way around Mars. For a start, due to the way telescopes invert images, everything is flipped around: Greece is south of Libya, Burma west of Arabia. What's more, Schiaparelli's geography was often more allusive than topographical. His planet is 360° of free association. Thus Solis Lacus is surrounded by areas named for others associated with the sun: Phoenix, Daedalus, and Icarus. The sea of sirens borders on the sea of the muses, presumably because Schiaparelli wanted to provide opportunity for their earthly feud to continue. Elysium leads to Utopia.

...

By the time he was through with Mars, Schiaparelli had given 304 names to features on its surface... Schiaparelli's proper names were triumphant and have in large part lasted until today. It was his common nouns that caused the problems. Schiaparelli saw a large number of linear features on the face of the planet and called them "canali" -- channels. Schiaparelli claimedto be agnostic as to the nature of these channels -- they might have been natural, or they might have been artificial. Percival Lowell, his most famous disciple, plumped firmly for the artificial interpretation.
-- Oliver Morton, Mapping Mars, pp. 15-6

Phoenix Mars Liftoff

Credit: NASA

The Phoenix Mars Lander lifted off successfully early Saturday morning from Cape Canaveral aboard a Delta II rocket. If all goes well, the Phoenix Mars Lander will land high up in the Vastitas Borealis next year, on May 25, 2008 (see the Mission Landing Sites map below, based on the topographical map produced by MOLA on Mars Global Surveyor). Also below is the launch video and excerpts from two press releases. The launch video is fairly long (run time: 9:56), starting just before the T-4:00 mark and ending roughly around the T+3:00 mark, when the second stage of the spacecraft ignites.




From NASA:

The Phoenix spacecraft has separated from the Delta II rocket and ground controllers at NASA's Deep Space Network have acquired its signal and begun assessing its health. The solar panels that will power the mission's cruise phase will be deployed and Phoenix will be pointed to best receive solar power and communicate with Earth.

The spacecraft has oriented itself to the sun as it was programmed to do. It will use solar panels to generate electricity during the nine-month coast to Mars. A separate set of solar arrays is attached to the lander itself. (Source)

From the Associated Press:

The Phoenix Mars Lander won't be looking for evidence of life on Mars but rather traces of organic compounds in the baked and moistened samples, which would be a possible indicator of conditions favorable for life, either now or once upon a time.

If organic compounds are present on Mars, they're more likely to have been preserved in ice. That's why NASA is aiming for the planet's high northern latitudes, where ice is almost certainly lurking just beneath the surface.

Only about six inches of soft red soil should cover the ice, and so the digger shouldn't have to probe too deeply. The ice is expected to be as hard as concrete, and a drill on the scoop will help gather enough frozen samples. Some dirt and ice samples will be baked and their vapors analyzed. Other soil samples will be mixed with onboard water and the muddy soup examined by onboard microscopes.

"We're really going there just to understand whether the conditions might have been hospitable for microbial life at some point," said the University of Arizona's William Boynton, lead scientist for the oven experiment.

Even if organic molecules pop up, they could be from incoming meteorites, Boynton noted. "It is important, I think, to keep in mind that we are just looking for organic molecules to see if the conditions are right that they could survive," he said, "and that we aren't really going to be making any inference about whether these molecules are indicative of life."

...

NASA has never attempted to land a spacecraft on Mars at such a high northern latitude. A lander intended for the red planet's South Pole went silent immediately upon arrival in 1999. That failure, combined with the loss of the companion Mars orbiter, prompted NASA to cancel a 2001 lander mission. The parts from that scrapped mission were used for Phoenix, thus its name, which alludes to the mythological bird that rises from its own ashes.

Mars' North Pole would have been too cold for Phoenix to operate, and so scientists opted for a little lower latitude for touchdown. Phoenix will be shooting for 68.35 degrees north latitude, comparable to Greenland or northern Alaska, and 233 degrees east longitude. The lander will parachute down, with pulse thrusters easing its final descent.

Scientists chose the flattest, rock-free zone they could to ensure success. The target landing area is "Kansas flat," according to the spacecraft team, with few if any big rocks that could overturn the stationary three-legged lander or bump against its circular solar panels and jam them. The 772-pound lander will stretch 18 feet across once its solar panels are deployed on Mars, and its weather mast will tower 7 feet.

Phoenix should help pave the way for human visitors, especially if it confirms the presence of water ice in large amounts near the pole, said Michael Meyer, NASA's lead Mars scientist. That would be a tremendous resource, he noted. But if organic matter is indeed found, it could pose a dichotomy: "As Mars gets more interesting, you may not want to send humans right away until you learn out a little bit more about the red planet and find out whether or not life ever got started there."
(Source)

Northern Polar Region

Credit: NASA/JPL/Malin Space Science Systems

Another hemispherical view of Mars, this time of the Martian northern polar region and taken by the Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter some time between late September and early October of 2006, during an instrument check. The Martian season at the time of these photographs is summer.

This image is a composite mosaic of four polar views of Mars, taken at midnight, 6 a.m., noon, and 6 p.m. local Martian time. This is possible because during summer the sun is always shining in the polar region. It shows the mostly water-ice perennial cap (white area), sitting atop the north polar layered materials (light tan immediately adjacent to the ice), and the dark circumpolar dunes. This view shows the region poleward of about 72° north latitude, covering much of the Vastitas Borealis (the northern lowlands). In this mosaic, each pixel is equivalent to about 900 meters (about 3,000 feet) of the surface.

Olympus Mons

Credit: NASA/JPL/Malin Space Science Systems

One week into this blog and I’ve finally gotten the chance to show off Olympus Mons. Even though this photo is nine years old (with some newer photographs available), it’s still one of the most beautiful to look at. Olympus Mons is the tallest known volcano in the solar system at 25 km (16 miles, or three times the height of Mount Everest) , although it is not the largest in terms of area and volume. Alba Patera, to the northeast of Olympus Mons, holds those records, being about 2.5 times as wide (approx. 1,600 km) as Olympus Mons (624 km). Still, Olympus Mons is huge; to give an earthly comparison, it's about as big as the state of Arizona.

This photo was taken by the Mars Global Surveyor on April 25, 1998 when the Martian northern hemisphere was in winter. In this picture, north is to the left and east is to the top. The west side of the volcano (the bottom part of the volcano in this picture) was clear and details on the surface appear very sharp. The skies above the plains to the east of Olympus Mons (the upper portion of the photo) were cloudy. Clouds were lapping against the lower eastern flanks of the volcano, but the summit skies were clear.

Schiaparelli

Credit: NASA

Finally, the missing hemispherical view. I knew I was missing one, but the original website where I got the previous three was missing the fourth for some reason. Anyway, here it is: the Schiaparelli hemisphere. Like the Valles Marineris, Syrtis Major and Cerberus mosaics, this mosaic is also composed from 100 or so photos from the two Viking Orbiters back in February 1980, when the season was early summer in the northern hemisphere. The view is how one would see Mars from 2,500 km above the surface.

The large crater at the center of the image is the 470 km diameter Schiaparelli. At upper left is the Oxia Palus region, exibiting many dark streaks with bright margins, caused by deposition and erosion due to wind. At the extreme lower right is Hellas Planitia; the white is due to carbon dioxide frost. The large crater at upper right is Cassini in the Arabia Terra region.

Deimos

Credit: NASA

Yesterday, we presented the Martian satellite Phobos (“Fear”); today, it’s Deimos’s (“Panic”) turn. Both satellites were discovered together by the American astronomer Asalph Hall; however, the names were suggested by Henry Madan (1838–1901), then Science Master of Eton, who got the idea from Book XV of the Iliad, where Ares (the Roman god Mars) summons Dread (Deimos) and Fear (Phobos).

Deimos (pronounced DEE-mos) is much smaller than Phobos, having dimensions of 15 x 12 x 10.4 kilometers, and being too small to have formed into a spherical shape. (Phobos, in contrast, is 26.8 × 21 × 18.4 kilometers in size.) Deimos is also much further away from Mars. Whereas Phobos only takes 7 hours, 39 minutes to orbit Mars, Deimos takes a little over 30 hours to complete one orbit.

The Viking 2 Orbiter took the above photo on October 5, 1977 from a distance of 1,400 kilometers.

Phobos

Credit: Malin Space Science Systems/NASA

Mars, of course, has two moons, Phobos (“Fear”) and Deimos (“Panic”). The photo above is of Phobos, the innermost and larger of the two moons, taken by the Mars Global Surveyor on August 19, 1998. Phobos and Deimos were discovered in 1877 by the American astronomer Asalph Hall. He had been on the verge of giving up his search to discover if Mars had any moons, but his wife, Chloe Angeline Stickney Hall, persuaded him to continue. As a result, when he did discover Phobos and Deimos, the largest crater on Phobos (visible above) was named after her, using her maiden name, Stickney.

The crater Stickney is about ten kilometers (six miles) in diameter. Individual boulders are visible on the near rim of the crater, and are presumed to be ejecta blocks from the impact that formed Stickney. Some of these boulders are enormous -- over 50 meters (160 feet) across. Also crossing at and near the rim of Stickney are shallow grooves that was originally thought to have been formed when the crater was made; however, further research from data by the Mars Express spacecraft have revealed that the grooves are independent of Stickney and are deposits of material thrown into space by impacts on the Martian surface.

The far wall of the crater shows lighter and darker streaks going down the slopes. The presence of material of different brightness on the far crater slopes, and in some of the grooves, shows that the satellite is made from different types of materials.

Cerberus

Credit: USGS, The Viking Project, NASA

One more hemispherical view of Mars to present, this being of Cerberus. Like the previous two pictures, this photo mosaic was taken by the Viking 1 Orbiter in February 1980 when Mars’ northern hemisphere was in the early summer. The view is from 2,000 kilometers above the surface. In this picture, there are thin white clouds scattered above the northern hemisphere.

Some of the prominent features in this image include the large dark area left of the image center known as Cerberus. The Elysium Planitia volcanic region shows as a bright yellow area north of Cerberus, with several well defined channels radiating from the flanks of this volcano. Just to the right of the center of the image is the crater Tettit, with its peculiar dark "tail" extending to the southwest. The arcuate markings on the upper right of the image are in the south-west Amazonis plains and are thought to be extended sand drifts. The three bright spots north of Cerberus, upper left of image, are volcanoes partially veiled by thin clouds.

Syrtis Major

Credit: USGS, The Viking Project, NASA

Yesterday, we showed part of the western hemisphere of Mars. The western hemisphere is dominated by several major geological features: Valles Marineris and the Tharsis bulge, upon which are four of the largest volcanos in the solar system: Olympus Mons (not visible in the picture) and the three Tharsis Montes (Ascraeus Mons (northern most), Pavonis Mons and Arsia Mons (southern most)). Alba Patera, an enormous shield volcano, is also in the western hemisphere, but is not visible in the picture.

Today, we show the Syrtis Major hemisphere; once again, this is a photo mosaic by the Viking 1 Orbiter in February 1980, when the season was early summer in the northern hemisphere. The viewer’s distance is 2,000 kilometers above the surface of the planet (for yesterday’s photo, the distance was 2,500 kilometers high).

The large bright colored area, located in the upper left area of the image is known as Arabia Terra. The dark area to the right of Arabia, called Syrtis Major Planus, is a low-relief volcanic shield of probable basaltic composition. Bright white areas to the south, including Hellas Planitia, an impact basin, at extreme lower right, are covered by carbon dioxide frost. Regions to the west and south of Syrtis Major are heavily cratered and relatively old. The dark feature coming around the western horizon is known as Sinus Sabaeus.

Welcome to Areology

Credit: USGS, The Viking Project, NASA

This is a new blog I'm creating that will focus on the planet Mars. I'm a big fan of two astronomy-oriented photoblogs, Astronomy Picture of the Day and LPOD - Lunar Photo of the Day, and I hope to do something similar for Mars. I'm not a professional areologist (who is? ;) ), but I'm very interested in the subject and perhaps we can learn a few things about Mars together. Should I make any mistakes, please let me know; corrections are always welcome.

The above photo of part of the western hemisphere of Mars (click to enlarge) is a compilation mosaic of over 100 photos taken by the Viking 1 Orbiter in February 1980.