Aftersplat

[mmcirvin]

Mainly Martian talks about possible policy implications of the Genesis parachute failure.

Seriously, having already cracked stupid jokes about this, I've gotta say that I feel terrible for the scientists and engineers working on Genesis... though my definite impression is that when you work on any space science mission, you have to accept the possibility of a catastrophic failure as a large part of the business. And it sounds as if they're going to try their damnedest to get some science out of the wreckage.

Comments

"That's impact, sir. Ground level."

[sunburn.livejournal.com]

The local (Seattle) public radio station made a call on Dr. Donald Brownlee, the UW Professor of Astronomy and the head of the Stardust program, whose spacecraft will be returning in a similar fashion with samples from a comet tail and from interplanetary dust. He was reportedly feeling Genesis's loss in his stomach.

Stardust uses fragile aerogel as a capture medium, so the whole mission (which, at around $200 million, was substantially cheaper than Genesis) could be a total loss if its sample capsule decides to hit the dirt in a similar fashion-- the samples will be in there, along with that desert dirt. More importantly, a second failure will potentially reduce the risk-tolerance of those who'd be funding future sample-return missions in the near future until a proven return method is cooked up.

However, the DoD continues to fund its SCOOP sampling-probes with unknown success.

[glitter-ninja.livejournal.com]

"Nova" had a special about the Mars Rover which focused quite a bit on the parachute used for the Rover landing. Apparently, these parachutes are all, like, REALLY HARD TO MAKE and stuff. Scientists spent a lot of time on-camera, stressing out and being generally downtrodden.

The Genesis failure is sad, but the Kirk/Khan jokes have been funny.