New InSight image of mole shows collapse of hole
Click for full movie.
The InSight science image has lifted the lander’s rover arm off the drill hole and taken a new series of images in an effort to discover what caused the mole to pop out during its most recent drilling effort.
The image to the right, cropped to post here, was the first in a short movie made from all the images taken over the course of a day. The sequence shows the change in shadows, which helps define the situation in the hole.
This image however I think tells all. It shows that the walls of the hole have collapsed all around the mole, widening it further. It also shows that, once the mole popped out to lean sideways against the left wall, much of that material then fell into the hole, refilling it. These facts are very evident when today’s image is compared with this image from October, taken prior to the most recent drilling effort. The hole has become much wider, there is more material inside it, and the mole is now much farther out.
All these facts bode ill for the mole ever succeeding in drilling down the planned fifteen or so feet to insert a heat probe into the interior of Mars in order to take the first ever measure of the planet’s interior.
An overall assessment of this NASA mission is not very positive. The contribution from its international partners is especially bad. The mission was launched two years late because the French effort to build the seismometer failed. NASA had to subsequently give the job to JPL to get it done. Now the heat sensor is a failure, because the German-built mole has failed to get the heat sensor where it needs to be.
The seismometer and heat sensor were InSight’s only science instruments. This means that we will likely only get results from one.
The support of my readers through the years has given me the freedom and ability to analyze objectively the ongoing renaissance in space, as well as the cultural changes -- for good or ill -- that are happening across America. Four years ago, just before the 2020 election I wrote that Joe Biden's mental health was suspect. Only in this year has the propaganda mainstream media decided to recognize that basic fact.
Fourteen years ago I wrote that SLS and Orion were a bad ideas, a waste of money, would be years behind schedule, and better replaced by commercial private enterprise. Even today NASA and Congress refuse to recognize this reality.
In 2020 when the world panicked over COVID I wrote that the panic was unnecessary, that the virus was apparently simply a variation of the flu, that masks were not simply pointless but if worn incorrectly were a health threat, that the lockdowns were a disaster and did nothing to stop the spread of COVID. Only in the past year have some of our so-called experts in the health field have begun to recognize these facts.
Your help allows me to do this kind of intelligent analysis. I take no advertising or sponsors, so my reporting isn't influenced by donations by established space or drug companies. Instead, I rely entirely on donations and subscriptions from my readers, which gives me the freedom to write what I think, unencumbered by outside influences.
Please consider supporting my work here at Behind the Black.
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Click for full movie.
The InSight science image has lifted the lander’s rover arm off the drill hole and taken a new series of images in an effort to discover what caused the mole to pop out during its most recent drilling effort.
The image to the right, cropped to post here, was the first in a short movie made from all the images taken over the course of a day. The sequence shows the change in shadows, which helps define the situation in the hole.
This image however I think tells all. It shows that the walls of the hole have collapsed all around the mole, widening it further. It also shows that, once the mole popped out to lean sideways against the left wall, much of that material then fell into the hole, refilling it. These facts are very evident when today’s image is compared with this image from October, taken prior to the most recent drilling effort. The hole has become much wider, there is more material inside it, and the mole is now much farther out.
All these facts bode ill for the mole ever succeeding in drilling down the planned fifteen or so feet to insert a heat probe into the interior of Mars in order to take the first ever measure of the planet’s interior.
An overall assessment of this NASA mission is not very positive. The contribution from its international partners is especially bad. The mission was launched two years late because the French effort to build the seismometer failed. NASA had to subsequently give the job to JPL to get it done. Now the heat sensor is a failure, because the German-built mole has failed to get the heat sensor where it needs to be.
The seismometer and heat sensor were InSight’s only science instruments. This means that we will likely only get results from one.
The support of my readers through the years has given me the freedom and ability to analyze objectively the ongoing renaissance in space, as well as the cultural changes -- for good or ill -- that are happening across America. Four years ago, just before the 2020 election I wrote that Joe Biden's mental health was suspect. Only in this year has the propaganda mainstream media decided to recognize that basic fact.
Fourteen years ago I wrote that SLS and Orion were a bad ideas, a waste of money, would be years behind schedule, and better replaced by commercial private enterprise. Even today NASA and Congress refuse to recognize this reality.
In 2020 when the world panicked over COVID I wrote that the panic was unnecessary, that the virus was apparently simply a variation of the flu, that masks were not simply pointless but if worn incorrectly were a health threat, that the lockdowns were a disaster and did nothing to stop the spread of COVID. Only in the past year have some of our so-called experts in the health field have begun to recognize these facts.
Your help allows me to do this kind of intelligent analysis. I take no advertising or sponsors, so my reporting isn't influenced by donations by established space or drug companies. Instead, I rely entirely on donations and subscriptions from my readers, which gives me the freedom to write what I think, unencumbered by outside influences.
Please consider supporting my work here at Behind the Black.
You can support me either by giving a one-time contribution or a regular subscription. There are five ways of doing so:
1. Zelle: This is the only internet method that charges no fees. All you have to do is use the Zelle link at your internet bank and give my name and email address (zimmerman at nasw dot org). What you donate is what I get.
2. Patreon: Go to my website there and pick one of five monthly subscription amounts, or by making a one-time donation.
3. A Paypal Donation:
5. Donate by check, payable to Robert Zimmerman and mailed to
Behind The Black
c/o Robert Zimmerman
P.O.Box 1262
Cortaro, AZ 85652
You can also support me by buying one of my books, as noted in the boxes interspersed throughout the webpage or shown in the menu above. And if you buy the books through the ebookit links, I get a larger cut and I get it sooner.
The heat sensor prospects are not looking good, but it does seem we’re getting valuable data from the SEIS seismometer and atmospheric conditions from the Temperature and Winds for InSight (TWINS), so it won’t be a complete bust. Still worth the price (which wasn’t all that much, relatively speaking), but it is definitely a disappointment if the mole turns out to be a failure. Clearly some re-thinking is in order there.
Or we could just wait for SpaceX to get there?
I keep asking myself “why not an auger”?
I said the same in the last update Ken.
Richard M,
I’d be quite willing to bet that SpaceX will be there before NASA and the Euros can gin up any sort of replacement. Given that Elon now runs a tunnel-drilling company too, I’m thinking that getting a piddly five meters into Mars with a dinky drill whose working principal seems to resemble a cranky toddler jumping up and down is not going to look very ambitious or cutting edge compared to whatever SpaceX brings along in the way of equipment. Anyone on SpaceX’s first human Mars expedition would likely be able to do better than Insight on his own with no drill technology more advanced than that used by John Henry the Steel Drivin’ Man.
Well, ExoMars is due to launch in the next window, and should drill down about 6 of your American feet ;-)
IF it lands safely and performs as designed..
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/ExoMars
I am excited about the next missions to Mars, but remain skeptical about the ESA mission, we have a real crappy record regarding landing on Mars… ( Zero percent thus far..)…
On a sidenote, I wish that at least one of the upcoming missions had the ability to confirm or refute the Viking experiments results… I understand that testing for some form of life is hard, but it seems to me that a bowl of water, a little sugar and a microscope would not be a hard experiment to put together…
Lee S: The wet cup experiments on Curiosity are actually an attempt to duplicate the Viking tests. Though I don’t know for sure right now, I suspect strongly that the Mars2020 rover will carry the same.
I was thinking what about the Rods From God idea?
20 foot hollow rods with everything they need inside.
A hardened tip and grid fins guidance.
An antenna could be trailed out of the tail for 100 feet that will just fall on the ground after impact. A small parachute could be used to stretch it out in the winds.
If we can make nuclear bombs that can take being fired out of a howitzer then this shouldn’t be too bad.