Welcome to Space News from the Electric Universe
brought to you by The Thunderbolts Project™
at Thunderbolts.info
On January 24th 2016 NASA scientists celebrated the 12th anniversary
of the arrival of the rover Opportunity on the planet Mars.
The celebration was marked by scientists' continued expression
of amazement over the Rover's astonishing long liveness.
In 2004 the rovers Spirit and Opportunity
were each given expected lifespans of about 90 days
and were projected to drive a total of 600 metres.
However, both Mars Exploration Rovers defied both expectation and explanation.
The rover Spirit survived until 2010
when it became stuck in the rugged soil of Gusev Crater
and today in 2016 Opportunity is still going strong
with mission scientists still unable to offer real answers for the Rover's endurance.
On February 5th 2016 the website planetary.org published a blog on the
"unparalleled achievement" of the Mars Exploration Rover team.
The article states:
"12 years is a long time for Rovers designed and dispatched for 3-month tours...
so far beyond the imagination, it's almost unbelievable.
The fact that Opportunity is still roving is beyond remarkable even,
truth told, for those who built her."
One Scientist quoted in the article states:
"While Opportunity is a bit worse for wear, I have to admit that once again
our ability to understand the lifetime of our own designs is really poor.
With their rather constant temperature environment and with fewer moving parts
it makes some sense to me that the Voyager spacecraft would live for decades.
It is harder for me to believe that a highly mechanical solar-powered Mars rover,
that must suffer rather impressive daily
and yearly temperature extremes and dust storms,
will be capable of lasting more than a few years."
Unfortunately the article does nothing to eliminate the mystery
of how the Rover has been able to survive
around 50 times longer than its projected lifespan.
Rather, the Rover's quote "unbelievable endurance"
is attributed to equally unbelievable factors
namely that occasional gusts of wind cleared dust from the solar panels for some reason.
To get a sense of just how profound the enigma is
let us look back all the way to 2004, when the mysteries began to accumulate.
The Rovers' original projected 90 day lifespans
were largely based on the extreme dustiness of the martian environment
as well as other weather and geological factors.
Of course scientists knew at the time that Mars,
whose tenuous atmosphere is less than 1% as dense as Earth's,
has occasional winds and intense dust storms
but since mechanical wind is obviously not a reliable means
to remove dust from any vehicle it was believed that the rover solar panels
would inevitably be buried in dust and eventually lose all power.
Yet in 2004, mission scientists reported the first
of a series of unexplained cleanings of the Rovers.
According to a news scientists' report, the rover Opportunity,
whose power had been steadily declining due to dust accumulation,
experienced a dramatic increase in power after it
"stumbled into something akin to a car wash".
Jim Erickson of NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory stated at the time:
"These exciting an unexplained cleaning events
have kept Opportunity in really great shape."
While the Rovers' cleanings and endurance remain unexplained by NASA
a clue to the puzzle is provided by the Agency's own news release dated July 14 2005.
"When humans visit Mars they'll have to watch out for towering electrified dust devils."
With these words NASA gave official sanction to an idea that had already
been percolating from separately funded research projects in recent years.
This research has explored the electrical component to dust devils in the Arizona desert.
Investigators were surprised to find that these vortices are electrically charged.
According to a news item entitled:
"Electrics sand findings could lead to better climate models",
one investigator has speculated that:
"Electric fields get so large on the Red Planet they produce ground-level sparks."
In fact, in the Electric Universe, the martian wind is indeed connected
to the cleaning of the Rovers' solar panels and thus its long liveness.
In previous episodes we've discussed the astonishing global dust storms
composed of giant towering vortices that have sometimes enveloped the entire Red Planet.
Also mysterious are the vast fields of Martian sand dunes and other wind driven features.
However, what if the electric fields associated with the dust devils
are not generated by sand particles rubbing together?
In the past we have suggested that the martian wind is analogous to an ionic wind,
such as that seen here and repeatedly shown in Space News episodes,
produced in laboratory experiments by Billy Yelverton.
Mars, like a comet, is a charged body moving on an elliptical orbit
through the Sun's weak electric field and like the planet Mars,
the comet 67P has revealed sand dunes
that could not have reasonably been formed by mechanical winds.
The discovery of fast moving electrons and electric fields
near the nucleus of comet 67 P explain both the filamentary comet jets
and the configuration of surface dust in dune-like features.
We suggest that it is not a coincidence that the largest dust storms on Mars
tend to occur when the Sun, Earth and Mars are in alignment.
Indeed when the greatest global dust storm, ever observed on Mars, began in 2001,
Mars had reached opposition and was the closest it had been to Earth in about 12 years.
This suggests that the electrical tickling of Mars by Earth's cometary plasma sheet
or magneto tail may be responsible for much of the tornado activity on the Red Planet.
Is the occasional electrostatic removal of dust from the Mars rover Opportunity
responsible for its extraordinary long liveness?
The irony is that scientists working with NASA have developed technology
that may provide the answer to this question.
Self-cleaning solar panels that rely on electrostatic cleaning
have proven extremely effective at dust removal.
As noted in a 2010 review,
"The technology was developed for future rover missions to Mars,
but it could work here on Earth to keep solar panels working at peak capacity.
It uses electrostatic charge to repel dust and force it to the edges of the panels.
It can remove 90% of the dust on a solar panel in a two-minute cycle..."
For how many additional years will this mystery endure
with NASA scientists continuing to acknowledge their amazement,
yet failing to consider any new theoretical possibilities
which all real mysteries demand.
For continuous updates on Space News from the Electric Universe
stay tuned to
Thunderbolts.info