NASA scientists convinced Mars has ice!

William Atkins
Friday, 20 June 2008 18:49

Science - Space

The flash memory problem that Phoenix has been saving over the past few days should be solved after a software patch, developed by Lockheed Martin Space Systems (Denver, Colorado), is uploaded to Phoenix in a few days.
If successful, the mission team will be able to once again store data inside the flash memory unit overnight and then send it back to Earth the next day.
Currently, in order not to lose any data, the data is being sent back to Earth the same day it is recorded.

Goldstein comments on the flash memory problem, “We now understand what happened, and we can fix it with a software patch. Our three-month schedule has 30 days of margin for contingencies like this, and we have used only one contingency day out of 24 sols." [University of Arizona]

Although a few problems have creeped into the mission, Phoenix is carrying out its mission to search for microbial life on Mars and to research the history of water on the planet.

Goldstein adds, "The mission is well ahead of schedule. We are making excellent progress toward full mission success." [University of Arizona]

The latest set of images from the Phoenix mission is found at Phoenix Images 2008-06-19_SOL_25.

Raw images from the mission so far taken by Phoenix appear on the NASA website “Phoenix Mission, Images, Raw.”