[extropy-chat] Mars rovers RIP?

Jeff Davis jrd1415 at yahoo.com
Sun Jan 1 23:42:14 UTC 2006


A year and a half ago I posted this:

http://lists.extropy.org/pipermail/extropy-chat/2004-June/006736.html

Wherein I said:

I suggest a "Rover expiration pool", where we all make
our predictions re the date of the rovers' demise.  

                 <snip>

I will guess five years from this date for the
problem-free rover, and two years for the rover with
the heater-always-on problem.

That's June 9th, 2009, and June 9th, 2006,
respectively.

And to make it interesting I will place ten bucks US
on each guess.

             ****************************

No one showed any interest at the time.  With the
appearance of this article:

Rovers Still Circle Mars
http://wired.com/news/wireservice/0,69949-0.html?tw=wn_tophead_5

Wherein we read:

           "These rovers are living on borrowed time.
            We're so past warranty on them,"... 

I once again invite you all to participate in the
"Rover expiration pool".  If we could get enough
people to join in, the pot could grow sufficiently to
make things veeeeery interesting.  I've already made
my predictions, I'm just six months away from one of
those.

Also it occurs to me that a clear definition of
"expiration" is needed.  Would it be loss of mobility?
 Loss of some specified degree of functionality? 
Total loss of signal?

Also, perhaps obviously, since it's likely (unless we
get thousands of participants) that no one will get
the expiration date exactly, the winner would be the
person who's prediction is closest to the actual
"expiration" date.

And finally, if any of you diligent space science
enthusiasts and rocket science professionals have an
inside track on the equipment specs -- you know like
batteries and solar panels -- and thereby a better
data set for making your predictions, would you
consider sharing those specs with the rest of
us,...say after waiting briefly for all your
lesser-informed brethren to commit themselves to their
predictions.

May the new year bring you love or good luck,...or
more love. 

Best, Jeff Davis

  "And I think to myself, what a wonderful world!"
                        Louie Armstrong



		
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