NASA, a brave group of pioneering individuals
seeking to break the restrictive boundaries that we might
venture beyond the stars. A heroic team that hope to understand
the wider bounds of this vast and beautiful creation in
an effort that maybe we might better understand ourselves
on this small lonely planet we call Earth. They've never
really adequately explained that bit, but still, it sounds
nice.
In the early days, this seemed to involve gluing a monkey
into a dustbin and catapulting it up to an altitude where
it had no hope of ever breathing or surviving the ordeal.
Still, things have come a long way since those heady chimp-propelled-summers.
Technology has advanced space exploration to extend the
vision and capabilities of what mankind can achieve in
this little corner of space we call the Milky Way.
The most recent expedition involved sending a probe to
mars in order to learn more of the red planets climate
and geography. The probe was meticulously designed and
built at a cost of around US$94 Million. Everything was
measured out as exact as science would allow, the craft
was launched and NASA waited.
On the 23rd September, the probe disappeared
round the back of mars... and was never seen or heard of
again; it stopped returning its calls, stopped writing home
and didn't even leave a post-it note on the red dust.
But how can we find fault with this loss, us being mere
earth bound citizens. NASA gave it their best shot and
lost the probe, these things happen, and at least they
tried.
It does seem strange though that the probe just vanished
without ever saying farewell. After all, NASA did have
everything calculated down to the very last inch. Well,
it was probably centimetres to be more precise, I mean,
who uses inches nowadays?
Some people still do, some don't. Still,
each to his own, and as long as each organisation decides
upon a standard and sticks to it, then there shouldn't ever
be any confusion.
Oh dear.
What did NASA have to say about the loss of the probe?
"The peer review preliminary
findings indicate that one team used English units (inches,
feet and pounds) while
the other used metric units for a key spacecraft operation,"
NASA deny that this error caused the
loss of the probe and point more specifically to the fact
that the error was not detected and adjusted and so the
probe swooped in 90km lower than expected. Hardly much of
a point; this still doesn't remove the 'complete and utter
dozy bunch of noggins' label that is hanging around the
neck of the worlds premier space agency.
At least the craft was unmanned, best
to have these small hitches before we send people off to
Mars. But although 'unmanned' rules out any humans having
been on board, it doesn't rule out a horse, some sheep,
3 chickens and a small tray of beans being lost with the
probe.
Now, let's clarify this. I am in no
way suggesting that there were any life-forms of any kind
aboard the probe. But there have been no specific denials
from NASA so far that they didn't bung a chimp onboard just
for old times sake.
NASA have been contacted and asked if there were any horses,
sheep, chickens or beans onboard, or if a mechanic was
accidentally left on the probe after hoovering inside,
or if they bunged a chimp onboard just for old times sake,
or maybe a tiny woodlouse wandered in whilst scientific
backs were turned.
So far, they have failed to comment.
