Mission to Mars

[ManImCool]

Anyone watching this? About half an hour ago this exploded all over my facebook newsfeed reminding me of this so I watched it touch down live. A lot of stoked geniuses in that control room right now.

[Riggins33]

Yupp, I'm glad I went to that website to see a bunch of people giving high fives.

[Grandma]

[ManImCool]

The nasa website and relating websites keep crashing from everyone trying to view the first photos that were taken. Servers can't handle the sudden extreme influx in traffic/hits. I wanna see!

Edit: I can view them here now

http://mars.jpl.nasa.gov/msl/multimedia/raw/

[Phenomena]

[ManImCool]

[TomAz]

It's like we sent a $2 billion rocket to mars equipped with a $2 camera.

[ivankay]

That's the protective lens they have on the camera for the landing. It's going to come off. The shots after that are going to be awesome.

[PlayaDelWes]

It's also a 256 X 256 image transmitted a minute after landing.

[Tubesock Shakur]

A camera on Mars? Pshhh why not Jupiter? Lazy scientists.

[HowToDisappear]

Press conference right now:

http://www.ustream.tv/NASAJPL

[marooko]

Hicks: Can you get a feature scan and pattern matching on him?
Van: No, he's smart, he never looks up.
Jones: Why does he have to look up?
Fiedler: The satellite is 155 miles above the Earth. It can only look straight down.
Jones: That's a bit limited, isn't it?
Van: [Sarcastically] Well, maybe you should design a better one.
Jones: Maybe I will idiot.

[HowToDisappear]

Twitpic of the landing from the HiRISE camera on the Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter:

[Tubesock Shakur]

Twitpic of the landing from the HiRISE camera on the Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter:

So fucking cool.

[amyzzz]

This is exciting.

[HowToDisappear]

It is! The feed last night was great. Seeing all the tension and then the exhilaration; there's nothing like a bunch of NASA scientists and engineers all laughing and cheering and crying.

Interesting tidbit I learned from the press conference: Curiosity's nuclear generator creates a great deal of heat, so its PRIMARY purpose is to keep the rover warm (in addition to providing a 100W trickle charge to the batteries to run the vehicle, of course). That way they didn't have to waste power on auxiliary heaters.

That HiRISE shot of the landing is stunning. SHIVERS

[Tubesock Shakur]

After spending yesterday at an amusement park and hearing quotes from the Lowest common denominator of the human race "Dat ride felt like I going to fly to outterspace" and "I only party with Sluts". Adults. It was refreshing and inspiring to watch that there are still brilliant minds pushing the human race to new heights.

[ManImCool]

That twitpic image isn't showing up for me in my browser. Is it the one from above where you can see the Curiosity descending with its supersonic parachute out?

[Tubesock Shakur]

http://twitter.com/MarsCuriosity

[Tubesock Shakur]

http://www.nasa.gov/mission_pages/msl/index.html

[ivankay]

[PlayaDelWes]

360-degree panorama of Mars
http://www.360cities.net/image/curio...61,11.86,110.0

[MR.NOVEMBER]

360-degree panorama of Mars
http://www.360cities.net/image/curio...61,11.86,110.0

Thanks for that.

[PotVsKtl]