This
story was updated at 1:10 pm EDT.
A
European spacecraft caught sounds from NASA's Phoenix Mars Lander during its
screaming Sunday descent to the red planet's arctic surface.
The
European Mars Express beamed the audio data to Earth shortly after NASA's
Phoenix Mars Lander touched down in the Martian arctic late Sunday. The signal from
Phoenix's descent comes through loud and clear after processing by the Mars
Express Flight Control Team.
A
shift occurred in the signal received by Mars Express due to the so-called
Doppler Effect, not unlike hearing the whistle of a passing train, as the
orbiter moved away from the lander.
Mars
Express successfully tracked Phoenix throughout
descent using the Mars Express Lander Communication system (MELACOM), even
during the expected transmission blackout window when ionization builds up
around the lander as it falls through the atmosphere.
The
signal finally cut out as Mars Express flew away and the lander passed out of
view. NASA's Mars Odyssey and Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter also watched
over Phoenix's successful landing.
Phoenix
is equipped with a microphone that was originally slated to record sounds
during landing in conjunction with a camera designed to take aerial photographs
of the probe's arctic landing site. While that plan was scrapped to avoid
complications with Phoenix's landing, the microphone may still be used on the
surface, mission managers said.
"We'd
all love to hear some noises from the surface
of Mars, that would be a first," said Phoenix principal investigator
Peter Smith of the University of Arizona.
The
$422 million Phoenix lander is a stationary probe equipped with a scoop-tipped
robotic arm to search for buried water ice beneath the arctic plains of its
Vastitas Borealis landing site. The spacecraft carries a Canadian-built weather
station, ovens and wet chemistry lab, and is designed to study Mars for at
least three months to determine if the planet's arctic circle could have once
supported primitive life.
Mars
Express will continue monitoring Phoenix by using MELACOM fifteen more times.
That should help demonstrate that the European Space Agency's spacecraft can
relay data from the Martian surface to Earth, and also transmit commands from
Earth to the lander.
Editor's
Note: This report has been changed to clarify that the Doppler Effect applies to
a shift in signal transmitted by Phoenix and received by Mars Express.
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