Friday, February 20, 2004
Well, we polluted Mars.
That didn't take long at all.
They announced today that one of the rovers on Mars found some weird thread things. They don't know what they are, and of course they will need to do some further investigating using all the magnificent tools onboard the rover. But I think their hunch that it's a piece of the fabric strewn across the landscape from the landing airbags is probably correct.
The article at Space.com, written by Leonard David, is a good one; David points out how contamination of the scene to be examined taints its untouched nature. Understandably, it makes it tough to know what's martian and what's not if, when you get there, you throw earth garbage everywhere.
It's not that I think the JPL engineering crew should have been a bit "greener" in their designs for Spirit and Opportunity; really, they were lucky to get the things down there and working in one piece to begin with. It reminds me of that unignorable piece of quantum theory that questions the notion that we can observe something without changing it, but am I the only one that wishes there'd be a way to just swing on by Mars and take a quick looksee without messing the place up?
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