Explanation: On Thursday this snapshot from a small plane 5,000 feet above Florida's Space Coast caught a rocket's trail rising into the blue morning sky. It was July's third launch of a mission from planet Earth bound for Mars. The Atlas V rocket left Cape Canaveral Air Force Station from Space Launch Complex 41 at 7:50am EDT carrying NASA's Mars 2020 Perseverance Rover. The car-sized Perseverance is headed for a landing at Jezero Crater on the Red Planet in February 2021. On board the sophisticated rover is the Ingenuity Mars Helicopter.
The agency's Mars 2020 mission is on its way. It will land at Jezero Crater in about seven months, on Feb. 18, 2021.
Click to play embedded YouTube video.
NASA's Mars 2020 Perseverance rover mission is on its way to the Red Planet to search for signs of ancient life and collect samples to send back to Earth.
Humanity's most sophisticated rover launched with the Ingenuity Mars Helicopter at 7:50 a.m. EDT (4:50 a.m. PDT) Thursday on a United Launch Alliance (ULA) Atlas V rocket from Space Launch Complex 41 at Cape Canaveral Air Force Station in Florida. ...
The ULA Atlas V's Centaur upper stage initially placed the Mars 2020 spacecraft into a parking orbit around Earth. The engine fired for a second time and the spacecraft separated from the Centaur as expected. Navigation data indicate the spacecraft is perfectly on course to Mars.
Mars 2020 sent its first signal to ground controllers via NASA's Deep Space Network at 9:15 a.m. EDT (6:15 a.m. PDT). However, telemetry (more detailed spacecraft data) had not yet been acquired at that point. Around 11:30 a.m. EDT (8:30 a.m. PDT), a signal with telemetry was received from Mars 2020 by NASA ground stations. Data indicate the spacecraft had entered a state known as safe mode, likely because a part of the spacecraft was a little colder than expected while Mars 2020 was in Earth's shadow. All temperatures are now nominal and the spacecraft is out of Earth's shadow.
When a spacecraft enters safe mode, all but essential systems are turned off until it receives new commands from mission control. An interplanetary launch is fast-paced and dynamic, so a spacecraft is designed to put itself in safe mode if its onboard computer perceives conditions are not within its preset parameters. Right now, the Mars 2020 mission is completing a full health assessment on the spacecraft and is working to return the spacecraft to a nominal configuration for its journey to Mars. ...
Know the quiet place within your heart and touch the rainbow of possibility; be
alive to the gentle breeze of communication, and please stop being such a jerk. — Garrison Keillor
I usually avoid saying how beautiful, wonderful an Apod is, but somehow this one does make me feel emotional. The slight curve of the smoke trail lifting into the darkening blue of the sky. As you may know, I'm not an American, but it made me think of the "The Star-Spangled Banner" and "the rockets red glare". It's not red, and there are no bombs bursting around it, but well done, America!
John
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Atlas-Centaur wrote:
<<The Atlas-Centaur was a US expendable launch vehicle derived from the SM-65 Atlas D missile. Launches were conducted from Launch Complex 36 at the Cape Canaveral Air Force Station in Florida.
Initially, a modified Atlas D designated LV-3C was used as the first stage This was quickly replaced by SLV-3C, and later the SLV-3D, both derived from the standard Atlas SLV-3 rocket. Two spaceflights, with the Pioneer 10 and Pioneer 11 space probes to Jupiter, Saturn and exiting the Solar System, used a spin-stabilized "Star-37E" solid propellant final stage weighing 2473 pounds and contributing 8000 mph to the velocities of the spacecraft.
Originally designed and built by the Convair Division of General Dynamics in San Diego, California, production of Atlas-Centaur at Convair ended in 1995 but was resumed at Lockheed-Martin in Colorado. The list of Atlas-Centaur ID numbers began with AC-1 launched on 8 May 1962 and ended with the last Atlas III (Centaur), AC-206, launched on 3 February 2005.
The Rocketdyne-powered Atlas-Centaur was sometimes referred to as a 2½ stage launch vehicle because the Atlas first stage (in most cases) jettisoned the twin-thrust-chamber booster engine prior to the completion of the first stage burn. Atlas-Centaur with a Rocketdyne-powered first stage was used for 167 launches between 1962 and 2004 by which time they had been superseded by Atlas V with a new first stage powered by a much more powerful Russian-designed and built RD-180 twin-chamber engine. (Atlas V is not generally referred to as "Atlas-Centaur" and does not share the AC- serial numbers of the original Atlas-Centaur that had the pressure stabilized first stages.)>>
A helicopter on Mars rather baffles me. What does it buy you? The atmosphere is so thin that a helicopter is surely extremely inefficient. In contrast, the quadcopter planned for Titan is absolutely ideal.
heehaw wrote: ↑Fri Jul 31, 2020 12:22 pm
A helicopter on Mars rather baffles me. What does it buy you? The atmosphere is so thin that a helicopter is surely extremely inefficient. In contrast, the quadcopter planned for Titan is absolutely ideal.
They've got some pretty sharp engineers. I suspect they knew what they were doing.
The main thing that argues for a quadcopter is stability and ease of control. But the cost is weight and reduced lift. Which is exactly the problem given a thin atmosphere. So I think on Mars a single, compound rotor makes the most sense (at the cost of more sophisticated control system). Titan has a thick atmosphere and generating sufficient lift is much less of an issue. And with winds (which are not a problem on Mars), more reactive control is important, too.
Chris
*****************************************
Chris L Peterson
Cloudbait Observatory https://www.cloudbait.com
<<The Black Hornet Nano is a military micro unmanned aerial vehicle (UAV) developed by Prox Dynamics AS of Norway, and in use by the armed forces of the United States, France, the United Kingdom, Germany, Australia, Norway, the Netherlands and India. The unit provides troops on the ground with local situational awareness. They are small enough to fit in one hand and weigh just over 16 g, including batteries. The air vehicle has three cameras; one looking forward, one looking straight down, and one pointing downward at 45 degrees. A Black Hornet package contains two helicopters, and since a 90% charge is reached in 20-25 minutes, the same as its hovering time, when one needs to be recharged the other is ready to fly. Top speed is 18 km/h.>>
JohnD wrote: ↑Fri Jul 31, 2020 8:58 am
I usually avoid saying how beautiful, wonderful an Apod is, but somehow this one does make me feel emotional. The slight curve of the smoke trail lifting into the darkening blue of the sky. As you may know, I'm not an American, but it made me think of the "The Star-Spangled Banner" and "the rockets red glare". It's not red, and there are no bombs bursting around it, but well done, America!
John
Thanks! Luckily, there are still some things that America is good at
-- "To B̬̻̋̚o̞̮̚̚l̘̲̀᷾d̫͓᷅ͩḷ̯᷁ͮȳ͙᷊͠ Go......Beyond The F͇̤i̙̖e̤̟l̡͓d͈̹s̙͚ We Know."{ʲₒʰₙNYᵈₑᵉₚ}
JohnD wrote: ↑Fri Jul 31, 2020 8:58 am
I usually avoid saying how beautiful, wonderful an Apod is, but somehow this one does make me feel emotional. The slight curve of the smoke trail lifting into the darkening blue of the sky. As you may know, I'm not an American, but it made me think of the "The Star-Spangled Banner" and "the rockets red glare". It's not red, and there are no bombs bursting around it, but well done, America!
Thanks! Luckily, there are still some things that America is good at
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Francis_Scott_Key wrote:
<<Francis Scott Key (August 1, 1779 – January 11, 1843) was an American lawyer, author, and amateur poet from Frederick, Maryland. Key observed the British bombardment of Fort McHenry in 1814 during the War of 1812. He was inspired upon seeing the American flag still flying over the fort at dawn and wrote the poem "Defence of Fort M'Henry"; it was published within a week with the suggested tune of the popular [drinking] song "To Anacreon in Heaven". The national motto "In God We Trust" derives from a line in "The Star-Spangled Banner".
Key was nominated for District Attorney for the District of Columbia by President Andrew Jackson, where he served from 1833 to 1841. He used his position as District Attorney to attack abolitionists.In 1833, he secured a grand jury indictment against Benjamin Lundy, editor of the anti-slavery publication Genius of Universal Emancipation, and his printer William Greer, for libel after Lundy published an article that declared, "There is neither mercy nor justice for colored people in this district [of Columbia]". Lundy's article, Key said in the indictment, "was intended to injure, oppress, aggrieve, and vilify the good name, fame, credit & reputation of the Magistrates and constables" of Washington. Lundy left town rather than face trial; Greer was acquitted.
In August 1836 Key obtained an indictment against Dr. Reuben Crandall. It accused Crandall of "seditious libel" after two marshals (who operated as slave catchers in their off hours) found Crandall had a trunk full of anti-slavery publications in his Georgetown residence/office. Key charged that Crandall's publications instigated slaves to rebel. Crandall's attorneys acknowledged he opposed slavery, but denied any intent or actions to encourage rebellion. Key, in his final address to the jury said: Are you willing, gentlemen, to abandon your country, to permit it to be taken from you, and occupied by the abolitionist, according to whose taste it is to associate and amalgamate with the negro? Or, gentlemen, on the other hand, are there laws in this community to defend you from the immediate abolitionist, who would open upon you the floodgates of such extensive wickedness and mischief?">>
Old APOD's never die; they just go back in in time 'til someone revives them!
Yup, as I just managed to revive this one! Speaking of which, I wonder how many email updates to discussion threads per day mega-posters like Chris and neufer get...must be a lot.
-- "To B̬̻̋̚o̞̮̚̚l̘̲̀᷾d̫͓᷅ͩḷ̯᷁ͮȳ͙᷊͠ Go......Beyond The F͇̤i̙̖e̤̟l̡͓d͈̹s̙͚ We Know."{ʲₒʰₙNYᵈₑᵉₚ}
How does an aerial photo of a rocket launch "link" to a ground based picture of the Great Bear and Comet NEOwise? Apart from the hyperlink that johnnydeep posted?
How does an aerial photo of a rocket launch "link" to a ground based picture of the Great Bear and Comet NEOwise? Apart from the hyperlink that johnnydeep posted?
It doesn't. But since I couldn't post to the correct discussion (because I didn't realize it was just a simple typo in the link), I posted here thinking someone might see and be able to correct the problem. Now, let's all please stop replying so this can die the death it deserves.
-- "To B̬̻̋̚o̞̮̚̚l̘̲̀᷾d̫͓᷅ͩḷ̯᷁ͮȳ͙᷊͠ Go......Beyond The F͇̤i̙̖e̤̟l̡͓d͈̹s̙͚ We Know."{ʲₒʰₙNYᵈₑᵉₚ}
Mars 2020 from 5,000 Feet
