January 21, 2004
Rover Spirit
Fails to Send Expected Data
Ground controllers were able to send commands
to the Mars Exploration Rover Spirit early Wednesday and received
a simple signal acknowledging that the rover heard them, but
they did not receive expected scientific and engineering data
during scheduled communication passes during the rest of that
martian day.
Earlier data was assembled into a mosiac
color photo of the lander and released today. The Columbia Memorial
Station, as it is now called, is shown along with the hills in
the east that the mission leaders intend to send Spirit toward
in the future if it still works reliably.
The Landing Site - Columbia
Memorial Station
Click
for larger image
Courtesy NASA/JPL/Cornell
Project managers have not yet determined
the cause of the communication problem, but similar events occurred
several times during the Mars Pathfinder mission. The team is
examining a number of different scenarios, some of which would
be resolved when the rover wakes up after powering down at the
end of the martian day, around midday Pacific time Wednesday.
The next opportunity to hear from the vehicle
is when the rover may attempt to communicate with the Mars Global
Surveyor orbiter at about 8:30 p.m. Pacific time tonight. A second
communication opportunity may occur about two hours later during
a relay pass via the Mars Odyssey orbiter. If necessary, the
flight team will take additional recovery steps early Thursday
morning (the morning of sol 19 on Mars) when the rover wakes
up and can communicate directly with Earth.
Full details on the rover's status will
be described in the next daily news conference Thursday at 9
a.m. Pacific time at the Jet Propulsion Laboratory, which will
be broadcast live on NASA Television.
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