NASA To Announce Major 'Find' On Mars

NASA has found "flowing water" on the surface of Mars.

http://cbs5.com/topstories/local_story_340020925.html

Dec 5, 2006 11:07 pm US/Pacific
NASA To Announce Major 'Find' On Mars

(CBS 5) WASHINGTON NASA is expected to make a major announcement Wednesday regarding a "significant find" on Mars.

NASA said the finding was a result of the Mars Global Surveyor mission.

According to Aviation Week and Space Technology, the space agency will talk about the discovery of "flowing water" on the surface of the Red Planet.

A NASA news conference is scheduled for 10 am US/Pacific.

they had found either Saddam's WMD, Bin Ladin, or Jimmy Hoffa's body.

DBDB

for the advancement of colonizing Mars. Think Hawking said recently we need to start looking into that.

While Mars would seem like a good candidate, there's one problem: it doesn't have a magnetic field left, which means that solar winds from the sun can ionize and strip away any thick and Earth-like atmosphere that we try to create via terraforming.

I think we may have to go to another solar system to find another Earth. With today's spaceships this is impractical in terms of time, but better technology could chop the time down to 5-6 years.

Today NASA said that if you were to spend 20 years living on Mars, one average one meteor would impact close enough for you to at least hear it.

However, the asteroids aren't as densely packed as sci-fi shows and cartoons would have you believe.

Maybe we destroy this planet and then move on to the next victim in space? I don't get it. Is it just because we can? What's the purpose. I know that the race to the moon brought to the public many new technologies and that would be the only reason I see for attempting it.

Maybe it'll be a little more equitable on Mars...

Hell we out number them. As the disparity grows, the more people want to rectify the situation.

eMarketer reports that audiences still spend considerably more time watching TV than on the internet.

A wealth of new media options, from gaming to the internet, hasn't made a dent in time spent watching television, according to new figures from Nielsen Media research. Nielsen reports that the average American household was tuned in eight hours and 11 minutes per day in the latest season, the highest ever since Nielsen began measuring TV viewing in the 1950s. The report doesn't address simultaneous use of media. Universal McCann estimates that U.S. adults simultaneously watched TV and used the internet for a total of 300 minutes per week in 2004.

http://www.imediaconnection.com/index.asp

the 2% includes just about everyone in europe , usa, and japan.

A self sustaining (or mostly self sustaining) colony on another solar object would be a backup system for humanity. We are one plague away from extinction.

Distraction from Iraq, and to make it a twofer, Halliburton gets the contract. No matter WHAT happens, the pukes make money from the US taxpayers. And their grandchildren.

From Jan. 2004:

Bush Announces, Privatizes Space Mission
Halliburton-KBR awarded lucrative, no-bid Moon preparation contract

http://www.uspressnews.com/articles/1167

(For instance.)

theoretically of course
weren't we all promised a robot servant by now? and a flying car?
IMO, we'll sink or swim as a species on THIS planet.

edit: for emphasis & syntax

"Mars Bitches!"

maybe my memory of Mars' atmospheric pressure is wrong, but it seems too low to support liquid water on the surface.

Atmospheric pressure at the poles is not much different as elsewhere; about 1/100th the atmospheric pressure on earth - practically vacuum.

Though at 'normal atmospheres', I think (sodium) salt water boils faster than pure water.

No doubt there are still more things in Heaven and Earth, Horatio, than are dreamt of by our current science... :shrug:

So salt water has a larger liquid temperature range than fresh water. Decreasing pressure narrows the liquid range, such that if the pressure is low enough, the water goes directly from ice to water vapor and no liquid water is possible.

The pressure is quite low, you are correct. However, if a large enough body of water was let loose all at once for example, it will remain liquid long enough to be seen and or create some residual mark of the surface. I wonder if they were lucky enough in some of the photo-recon passes to have actually captured an image or two of geyser or "flash-flooding" activity as it is happening? That would be exciting.

The pressure in the bottom valleys can be as high as 1.2 kPa, compared to our average of 101.3kPa, so that's about one one-hundreth of ours. Is that enough for liquid water?

"the average recorded temperature on Mars is -63C (-81F) with a maximum temperature of 20C (68F) and a minimum of -140C (-220F)."

At -63C the vapor pressure of water is probably single-digit Torr... at 20C it's somewhere around 15 Torr. Vapor pressure is the pressure at which water boils at a specific temperature. Since 101.325 kPa = 1 atm = 760 torr, 15 Torr is about 2 kPa, so it would alternate between solid, liquid, and boiling over the range of temperatures on the surface in the deepest valleys. So yes, it's possible it can remain liquid sometimes, but it would always boil on a hot day.

In other words, Mars could be host to a "Primordial Soup" that's more like "Primordial Jello."

Rivers of life teeming with gefilte fish, too?

Rivers of life teeming with gefilte fish, too?

Would that mean the Jews were right all along? ;)

Gefilte Fish w/Gelatin - pareve
Posted by : Lita Lotzkar

2 lbs. whitefish
2 lbs. yellow pike
1 lb. carp
3 medium onions, peeled and sliced
salt to taste
2 Tbsp. sugar
2 Tbsp. matzo meal
3 eggs, lightly beaten
3 or 4 carrots, scraped and cut into rounds
Freshly ground pepper (white or black)
3 packages unflavored gelatin

More:
http://www.cyber-kitchen.com/rfcj/PESACH-fish/Gefilte_Fish_with_Gelatin_-_pareve.html

Since the aquifiers are under pressure the water doesn't evaporate, and if the aquifier is breached the water geysers up to the surface and it takes some time to boil away, during which it can carve channels, wash away your campsite, etc. I have also seen some speculation because of the mud-like consistency of some of the soils encountered by Spirit that very highly concentrated brine might be stable in the soil, but I don't know if they've done any followup on that.

Gil Levin presents an argument that at some places on Mars, the temperature and pressure allow liquid water, at least during the day and in the summer.

wonder what the motive is. Funding for a manned visit and the weaponized moon fort, er, base?

There are numerous pics of muddy rover tracks that then freeze over with ice.


On edit, when will they talk about the cool foliage and stuff apparent in some pics? Here's one that looks like pine trees in the snow from the Mars Global Surveyor Mars Orbiter Camera (click on it to enlarge)

Also, the old sea shells that litter the place


Can't wait for them to start talking about this good stuff!

The Repukes lie about everything..what say those photos are shopped.

Money needs to be spent here.

After Katrina victims are taken care of..let us know whats new.

My reference was pointed at the Aviation Week and Space Technology mag. They are a mouthpiece associated with Lockeed/Martin Industries...which facilitate the Repuke agenda.

It will be interesting to see if NASA themselves make the announcement at 1 pm EST today.

Go away, luddite. :grr:

As I said, it's all BS designed to scarf up money from other US emergencies like Katrina Relief..

Read the link for yourself. Know this, there are no such things as conspiracy theorys...IT's ALL TRUE..

Scroll downward to the TALK BACK message..

http://science.monstersandcritics.com/news/article_1230439.php/Evidence_of_water_discovered_on_Mars_surface_NASA

How much do you think we'd know about Global Warming if we never studied Venus?

They have not made a secret of the fact that they have found water on Mars - frozen water.
The rest of your assertions is mere speculation.

If so, where did they come from?

Okay, not his personal freshness, really.

Seems you've been watching the rovers, so you probably saw it too.

It was basically a wood-like log laying on it's side in the middle of a rock field, I guess NASA decided it wasn't worth the 10 second trip to check it out closer.

:) Still looks like a railroad tie to me.

(Squashed by the landing of one of the rovers!)

1) Ok, the tracks are interesting, but hardly some conspiracy. If there were some context or a caption, I'd be appreciative.

2) Apparent foliage? Pine trees? From the page you stole that image from you can see that the width of the image is nearly 3 km, and it's more than 65 km from top to bottom. You can make out foliage and pine trees in that blurry mess and at that scale? The only region where the image is relatively focused (the center panel) shows lots of boulders.

3) I see nothing that looks remotely similar to sea shells.

I brought up Google Earth. Images of earth from about 6 km elevation show individual trees at the size depicted in the photo you mention. Purely guessing, though, I would say that that NASA photo was from about double that altitude - anyone know? From 12 km on Google Earth you cannot make out individual trees, but patches of trees are quite visible.

but that doesn't really matter. I also went to Google Earth and used it to create the following image:



The 2.93 km long line should come out to be the same actual width on a computer screen as the 2.93 km width on the Martian photo. Scale matters a lot, and the "trees" are positively humungous. Each pixel in the Martian image is nine square metres!

to investigage further. I just took Google up to an altitude where you could no longer see individual "earth" trees. :-)

The data on the spacecraft's altitude and pixel dimensions are directly off the page that the photo came from. Obviously, if you took google earth up to 373 km you wouldn't get a very clear image because I think it's meant to simulate someone's unaided view from an airplane or space ship at that height. The Martian satellite has a zoom lens :-)

<snip>

Winds of change

Suffice to say, planetary geologists classify such proof-of-life observations as dubious. Claims of Banyan trees and changing vegetation patterns are suspect.

"I've looked at a lot of the MGS images. That's what I do. I'm afraid I don't see any diagnostic evidence that would support these claims. It doesn't mean it's not worth looking and thinking about. But we don't have the data today to support such contention," said Ron Greeley, a leading planetary scientist at Arizona State University in Tempe.

Richard Zurek, a Mars researcher at the Jet Propulsion Laboratory in Pasadena, California, warns that Mars is a different world contrasted to Earth. "We really have to be careful about drawing too tightly on our terrestrial analogs," he said.

Zurek said that taking just a single image and stirring in speculation is inadequate. "You need to look at all the data and bring all the data to bear," he said.

Seasonal processes on Mars can deceive the eye, Zurek said. Wind moving a thin veneer of dust around, he said, can make the Martian surface look very different from one period of time to another.

"So right now, I haven't seen any evidence that really points to vegetation as being an explanation for what we see. There are alternate explanations, like the wind blowing across the planet," Zurek said.

<snip>

"Most of the images in question that I looked over are of dunes in the polar regions. They are beginning to defrost as winter draws to a close. The sand composing the dunes is dark and frost is bright, thereby causing the spotted pattern as the dune defrosts. This is not vegetation but rather the natural defrosting of dunes and sand sheets," Rice said.

More:
http://www.space.com/scienceastronomy/solarsystem/clarke_mars_banyon_010709-1.html

how much food will they pack on the ship? And will anyone bitch if they eject poo into space?

Personally, I don't think I'll live long enough to see that. but the thought of shit orbiting the Sun is funny.

There is vaporized urine orbiting around the Earth as we speak, now THAT is funny. Though I don't know if they ejected the shit, nowadays, they compact it to be disposed of on Earth.

How big of a truck are they going to tow with them to eventually burn up in the atmosphere?

5x-.5lbx-1705=4262.5lbs.


That's a HUGE shitwagon.

...I would consider the shit I'd created on the way there to be a very valuable substance indeed. There are too many useful things to do with it to treat it like trash to be bagged and set on the curb back on Earth.

...but yes, I think they'd need to find a use for all the organic matter they take with them. They probably aren't going to find any more once they get there.

They have distilleries and filters on the ISS to recycle Urine, as an example, into water, and its purer than what you get from the tap too. This doesn't mean they will eat their own shit, but, then again, don't we eat cow shit on Earth, and have for centuries? I mean, a multi-month or year voyage to another planet will require some way to grow food during the trip. Human waste would be the most efficient means of maintaining the nitrate level in whatever garden or farm is grown on said spacecraft, especially if it lacks a large amount of topsoil.

High protien meals, catheters and 5 out of 7 day sleeping (in rotation) might make the trip much less tedious.

But then there's the question of sex.

I'm surprised they'd even let THIS out...still, what an amazing development :-)

99942 Apophis
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

(99942) Apophis (previously known by its provisional designation 2004 MN4) is a near-Earth asteroid that caused a brief period of concern in December 2004 because initial observations indicated a relatively large probability that it would strike the Earth in 2029. However, additional observations provided improved predictions that eliminated the possibility of an impact on Earth or the Moon in 2029. However there remained a possibility that during the 2029 close encounter with Earth, Apophis would pass through a "gravitational keyhole", a precise region in space no more than about 400 meters across, that would set up a future impact on April 13, 2036. This possibility kept the asteroid at Level 1 on the Torino impact hazard scale through August 2006.

Additional observations of the trajectory of Apophis revealed the "keyhole" would likely be missed and on August 5, 2006, Apophis was lowered to a Level 0 Torino impact hazard scale. As of October 19, 2006 the impact probability for April 13, 2036 is estimated at 1 in 45,000. An additional impact date in 2037 has been identified, however the impact probability for that encounter is 1 in 12.3 million.

<snip>

Additional observations of the trajectory of Apophis revealed the "keyhole" would likely be missed and on August 5, 2006, Apophis was lowered to a Level 0 Torino impact hazard scale. As of October 19, 2006 the impact probability for April 13, 2036 is estimated at 1 in 45,000. An additional impact date in 2037 has been identified, however the impact probability for that encounter is 1 in 12.3 million.

More:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/99942_Apophis

and send them to Mars to develop the place. We'll follow once they send back the sales flyers.

I thought it was lost

:rofl: :rofl: :rofl: :rofl: :rofl: :rofl: :rofl: :rofl:

i wonder what it tastes like? And where does it come from, are there clouds on Mars?

It's that they found this guy:



:sarcasm:

:rofl: :rofl: :rofl:

PS, If you're under 40, you probably have no clue about what I'm talking about!

And i used to love my favorite martian:)
when was like 7-9 always watched the munsters, bewitched, my favorite martian, Gilligan's island,
and a few others that came on right after one another :)
it was kinda like a Pleasantville marathon every day.

I remember watching it on its first go-round, but even I was really to young to appreciate it. My big sister was a fanatic, though.

The tanker convoy back to D.C. to be provided by ExxonMobil at a greatly profitable amount.

:sarcasm:

Live TV Link: http://www.nasa.gov/ntv

PRESS RELEASE

<snip>

Dec. 4, 2006
MEDIA ADVISORY: M06-186

NASA Schedules Briefing to Announce Significant Find on Mars

WASHINGTON - NASA hosts a news briefing at 1 p.m. EST, Wednesday, Dec. 6, to present new science results from the Mars Global Surveyor. The briefing will take place in the NASA Headquarters auditorium located at 300 E Street, S.W. in Washington and carried live on NASA Television and www.nasa.gov.

The agency last week announced the spacecraft's mission may be at its end. Mars Global Surveyor has served the longest and been the most productive of any spacecraft ever sent to the red planet. Data gathered from the mission will continue to be analyzed by scientists.

Panelists include:
- Michael Meyer -- Lead Scientist, Mars Exploration Program, NASA Headquarters, Washington
- Michael Malin -- President and Chief Scientist, Malin Space Science Systems, San Diego, Calif.
- Kenneth Edgett -- Scientist, Malin Space Science Systems
- Philip Christensen -- Professor, Arizona State University, Tempe, Ariz.

Reporters at participating agency field centers will be able to ask questions. For more information about NASA TV streaming video, downlink and schedule information, visit the web at:

http://www.nasa.gov/ntv


For information about NASA and agency programs, visit:

http://www.nasa.gov


- end -

text-only version of this release
http://www.nasa.gov/home/hqnews/2006/dec/HQ_M06186_Mars_Briefing.txt

NASA press releases and other information are available automatically by sending a blank e-mail message to hqnews-subscribe@mediaservices.nasa.gov. To unsubscribe from this mailing list, send a blank e-mail message to hqnews-unsubscribe@mediaservices.nasa.gov.

More:
http://www.nasa.gov/home/hqnews/2006/dec/HQ_M06186_Mars_Briefing.html

It certainly is not contained anywhere in your links.

PR Newswire (press release), NY - 9 minutes ago
http://www.prnewswire.com/cgi-bin/stories.pl?ACCT=104&STORY=/www/story/12-06-2006/0004486662&EDATE=

NASA Images Suggest Water Still Flows in Brief Spurts on Mars

WASHINGTON, Dec. 6 /PRNewswire/ -- NASA photographs have revealed
bright new deposits seen in two gullies on Mars that suggest water carried
sediment through them sometime during the past seven years.

"These observations give the strongest evidence to date that water
still flows occasionally on the surface of Mars," said Michael Meyer, lead
scientist for NASA's Mars Exploration Program, Washington.

Liquid water, as opposed to the water ice and water vapor known to
exist at Mars, is considered necessary for life. The new findings heighten
intrigue about the potential for microbial life on Mars. The Mars Orbiter
Camera on NASA's Mars Global Surveyor provided the new evidence of the
deposits in images taken in 2004 and 2005.

"The shapes of these deposits are what you would expect to see if the
material were carried by flowing water," said Michael Malin of Malin Space
Science Systems, San Diego. "They have finger-like branches at the downhill
end and easily diverted around small obstacles." Malin is principal
investigator for the camera and lead author of a report about the findings
published in the journal Science.

The atmosphere of Mars is so thin and the temperature so cold that
liquid water cannot persist at the surface. It would rapidly evaporate or
freeze. Researchers propose that water could remain liquid long enough,
after breaking out from an underground source, to carry debris downslope
before totally freezing. The two fresh deposits are each several hundred
meters or yards long.

The light tone of the deposits could be from surface frost continuously
replenished by ice within the body of the deposit. Another possibility is a
salty crust, which would be a sign of water's effects in concentrating the
salts. If the deposits had resulted from dry dust slipping down the slope,
they would likely be dark, based on the dark tones of dust freshly
disturbed by rover tracks, dust devils and fresh craters on Mars.

Mars Global Surveyor has discovered tens of thousands of gullies on
slopes inside craters and other depressions on Mars. Most gullies are at
latitudes of 30 degrees or higher. Malin and his team first reported the
discovery of the gullies in 2000. To look for changes that might indicate
present-day flow of water, his camera team repeatedly imaged hundreds of
the sites. One pair of images showed a gully that appeared after mid-2002.
That site was on a sand dune, and the gully-cutting process was interpreted
as a dry flow of sand.

Today's announcement is the first to reveal newly deposited material
apparently carried by fluids after earlier imaging of the same gullies. The
two sites are inside craters in the Terra Sirenum and the Centauri Montes
regions of southern Mars.

"These fresh deposits suggest that at some places and times on
present-day Mars, liquid water is emerging from beneath the ground and
briefly flowing down the slopes. This possibility raises questions about
how the water would stay melted below ground, how widespread it might be,
and whether there's a below-ground wet habitat conducive to life. Future
missions may provide the answers," said Malin.

Besides looking for changes in gullies, the orbiter's camera team
assessed the rate at which new impact craters appear. The camera
photographed approximately 98 percent of Mars in 1999 and approximately 30
percent of the planet was photographed again in 2006. The newer images show
20 fresh impact craters, ranging in diameter from 7 feet (2 meters) to 486
feet (148 meters) that were not present approximately seven years earlier.
These results have important implications for determining the ages of
features on the surface of Mars. These results also approximately match
predictions and imply that Martian terrain with few craters is truly young.

Mars Global Surveyor began orbiting Mars in 1997. The spacecraft is
responsible for many important discoveries. NASA has not heard from the
spacecraft since early November. Attempts to contact it continue. Its
unprecedented longevity has allowed monitoring Mars for over several years
past its projected lifetime.

NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory, Pasadena, manages the Mars Global
Surveyor mission for the NASA Science Mission Directorate, Washington. For
more information about NASA and agency programs, visit:
http://www.nasa.gov


SOURCE NASA

Related links:
# http://www.nasa.gov/

More:
http://www.prnewswire.com/cgi-bin/stories.pl?ACCT=104&STORY=/www/story/12-06-2006/0004486662&EDATE=

I reserve judgment until some other nation can confirm.

considering someone wants a Moon outpost soon...and maybe some more operating cash.

And he is a FAN of this kind of stuff...when even he is skeptical of something (maybe not the content, but the timing of the delivery of said content).

to release the news. So it's just a coincidence it gets released the day after "Moon Base" proposals.

:sarcasm:

But, somehow I doubt Mars has "flowing, liquid" water now--maybe evidence from the past?...

Nonethess water must at least partically explain why the Bushies* are buying up one of the world's largest and last remaining aquifers--in Paraquay, since they see that oil won't be the resource to exploit forever.

Reporting that image changes attributable to flowing have been identified (1999-2004)

Aren't temperatures far below freezing?

at least in the winter, in the summer, temperatures are a little milder, up to 68 degrees Fahrenheit. However, this is ON the surface, BELOW the surface is a different matter, most likely what they found are underground aquifers, where its just warm enough, and under enough pressure, for liquid water to exist, and some break though the crust to rush onto the surface before freezing.

Can't be flowing water there now...maybe frozen?

Here's the story from NASA with some photos, etc. http://www.nasa.gov/mission_pages/mars/main/index.html

I find this to be quite exciting.

they claim can only be attributable to flowing water.

Actually, I guess it would more properly called a marsothermal thing.

Anyway, maybe the planet has heat within which keeps water from freezing, much like ours does.

My favorite show of all time!!! OUTER LIMITS



Dont tell Halliburton there is water on Mars......

I keep wishing that someone could remake it with a real Hollywood budget. But Uncle Harlan would probably still hate it no matter what.

Should we start looking for monoliths now?

:yoiks:

:nuke:

their water?