backtop

Print E-mail del.icio.us 150 comment(s) - last by sld.. on Nov 26 at 10:19 AM
Indian scientists say they meant to do that and hope for a future "soft" landing

Going to the moon is old news to most Americans after we sent a manned mission to Earth's satellite in the 1960's. Since then, several other countries have sent unmanned missions to the moon to study the satellite, but no one has yet replicated America's manned landing.

India has now joined the small cadre of nations to send unmanned missions to the moon including the U.S., China, Russia, ESA, and Japan. India launched its moon mission in October sending its spacecraft called Chandrayaan-1 towards the moon with a lunar probe onboard.

The probe was sent hurtling towards the surface of the moon to an eventual crash landing in the Shackleton crater on the moon's south pole. The lander was emblazoned with the Indian flag and hit the surface of the moon moving at about 3,100 miles per hour.

Indian scientists say that the crash was planned and that they will use the data collected by the probe during its descent to plan a future soft landing on the moon. The descent to the surface took 25-minutes according to Space.com. Instruments on the probe included a video imaging system, radar altimeter and a mass spectrometer.

The video system took pictures of the moon during the decent while the altimeter measured the rate of decent and the mass spectrometer studied the thin atmosphere on the moon. India released some raw images taken and said that it had not yet begun to analyze the data returned by the probe. India has plans to land a rover on the moon in 2011 and hopes to one day send a manned mission.

Comments     Threshold


This article is over a month old, voting and posting comments is disabled
India – Researching the Obvious since 2008
By arazok on 11/17/2008 2:50:44 PM , Rating: 5
When asked what they discovered from this probe, a scientists was quoted as saying “We discovered that 3,100 MPH is too fast to land on the surface of the Moon.”.

In other news, Indian scientists discovered that the chainsaw is ineffective when performing open-heart surgery...




RE: India – Researching the Obvious since 2008
By Lord 666 on 11/17/2008 3:00:18 PM , Rating: 5
Or in other words its interesting that with 2008 technology the Indian team were not able to pull off a soft landing, but the US did it on the first try back in 1969?


RE: India – Researching the Obvious since 2008
By Mitch101 on 11/17/2008 3:07:33 PM , Rating: 5
That's what happens when you outsource your space program.


RE: India – Researching the Obvious since 2008
By othercents on 11/17/2008 3:29:24 PM , Rating: 3
I don't understand why data like this couldn't be shared between all space agencies. Really does every space agency have to crash a probe into the moon just to verify the data that is already available?

Other


By snownpaint on 11/17/2008 5:13:25 PM , Rating: 2
I said the same thing, jokingly, about aliens visiting earth.. Hopo: "There is a Federation of Aliens and even if one visits Earth, the rest have to 'just' say they were here." I used this example to explain a topic debate between friends as to why aliens keep landing on earth (over the decades) and why their spaceship descriptions are different. We debate stupid ideas sometimes..


RE: India – Researching the Obvious since 2008
By Sahkuhnder on 11/17/2008 5:17:40 PM , Rating: 3
India didn't crash a probe into the moon to verify the data. It did it to wipe out a UFO base!

India Daily: Will India reveal the existence of the UFO bases in the moon?

http://www.indiadaily.com/editorial/20219.asp

"But there is a major debate in process within Indian Government and Indian Space Research Organization. The debate is on telling the truth to the world about the existence of the UFO bases in the moon."

LMFAO!


RE: India – Researching the Obvious since 2008
By ashishmishra on 11/17/2008 6:10:03 PM , Rating: 2
ROFL, that is hilarious. I seriously hope there wasn't an actual debate but just some maverick journalism.


By Souka on 11/17/2008 7:07:56 PM , Rating: 3
Oh my... I thought the term "maverick" ended with the election...


By FireSnake on 11/18/2008 2:57:13 AM , Rating: 2
Couldn't of said better myself! Rated you up. I guess they are just being selfish :-/


RE: India – Researching the Obvious since 2008
By JonnyDough on 11/17/2008 3:52:57 PM , Rating: 5
quote:
Indian scientists say that the crash was planned and that they will use the data collected by the probe during its decent to plan a future soft landing on the moon.


Did you mean " descent ?"

This is what happens when you outsource your blogs.


RE: India – Researching the Obvious since 2008
By FaceMaster on 11/17/08, Rating: 0
RE: India – Researching the Obvious since 2008
By Xavitar on 11/17/2008 6:51:02 PM , Rating: 5
Nod for the Descent reference!


RE: India – Researching the Obvious since 2008
By FaceMaster on 11/17/08, Rating: 0
RE: India – Researching the Obvious since 2008
By JonnyDough on 11/17/2008 9:21:37 PM , Rating: 3
I remember the game. :-)


By GreenEnvt on 11/18/2008 10:56:23 AM , Rating: 2
I played so much Descent1/2/3 over the years. Lan parties all over north america.
Went to the Descent3 $50,000 tournament, won a bunch of prizes.
Loved that series.


By foolsgambit11 on 11/17/2008 4:00:44 PM , Rating: 2
He obviously knows the difference, and just misspelled it - it's correctly spelled at the beginning of the next sentence.

Give him credit for using the correct 'its', though.


By swampjelly on 11/18/2008 9:43:38 AM , Rating: 2
quote:
That's what happens when you outsource your space program.


The first two responses were definitely 5's, but the this one is an ELEVEN!!


RE: India – Researching the Obvious since 2008
By omnicronx on 11/17/2008 3:29:01 PM , Rating: 5
The US did exactly the same thing with the Ranger program before they attempted a soft landing with the Surveyor program.

And just so you know, the first 6 missions were considered failures. It was not until their 7th mission that they managed to impact the moon on purpose with functional sensors.

The Appollo missions were the third set of the missions to the moon. 9 probe missions (Ranger program), 7 landing missions and 3 full manned missions to the moon (without landing) were completed before Neil Armstrong walked on the moon during the Apollo 11 mission.

I'm not trying to make it out as though the Apollo based missions were not a thing of greatness, especially since they did it 40 years ago, but don't make it out as though it took them one try to send a probe to the moon and one try to send man to the moon, because this is just not the case.


RE: India – Researching the Obvious since 2008
By FITCamaro on 11/17/2008 3:32:17 PM , Rating: 5
Yeah but the internet didn't exist then so no one could make fun of them. Now we have that luxury. :)