MGS: Glitch forces Mars probe shut-off

[telfrow]

<font color="yellow"><i>A glitch has forced Nasa's Mars Global Surveyor (MGS) spacecraft to shut down its science instruments. <br /><br />The spacecraft has switched into a "safe mode", in which the instruments and some other systems are turned off. <br /><br />Team members are racing to get the probe out of this mode so it can photograph the presumed crash site of a US Mars mission lost in 1999. <br /><br />The pictures could decide whether design changes are needed on a probe due to launch for Mars in 2007. <br /><br />Next week will provide the last opportunity to take images of the crash site of Mars Polar Lander (MPL) for another two years. <br /><br />Small talk <br /><br />Some unexplained switching back and forth between Global Surveyor's main onboard processing computer and its back-up forced the craft into the safe mode. <br /><br />In this mode, MGS turns off its science instruments but leaves many other systems on. <br /><br />The spacecraft also turns towards the Sun to get the maximum charge possible on its batteries, and it communicates with Earth on its low-gain antenna only. <br /><br />On 30 July, the main onboard processing computer unexpectedly switched to its back-up computer. Then, on 26 August, the back-up computer switched back to the primary computer, which had been re-booted in the meantime. <br /><br />"[The primary computer] was left in its safe mode. It was powered, but when the back-up computer switched back to it, the whole spacecraft went into safe mode," Thomas Thorpe, MGS project manager from Nasa's Jet Propulsion Laboratory in California, told the BBC News website. </i></font><br /><br />Full story here: http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/sci/tech/4213706.stm <div class="Discussion_UserSignature"> <strong><font color="#3366ff">Made weak by time and fate, but strong in will to strive, to seek, to find and not to yeild.</font> - <font color="#3366ff"><em>Tennyson</em></font></strong> </div>

 

[scottb50]

Tell me they don't use Microsoft software! <br /><br />Microsoft, the prince of Darkness in the 21st century. <div class="Discussion_UserSignature"> </div>

 

[davf]

Yeah... they are now going to do a driver roll-back and see if that fixes it. <img src="/images/icons/wink.gif" />

 

[CalliArcale]

*laughs*<br /><br />Actually, I believe it uses VxWorks, a popular POSIX-derived real-time operating system in the aerospace industry. It's made by Wind River.<br /><br />I hope this isn't the beginning of the end for MGS. It's well past its original design life, so I'm not too surprised that it's starting to have issues, but I'd be sad to see it go. <div class="Discussion_UserSignature"> <p> </p><p><font color="#666699"><em>"People assume that time is a strict progression of cause to effect, but actually from a non-linear, non-subjective viewpoint it's more like a big ball of wibbly wobbly . . . timey wimey . . . stuff."</em>  -- The Tenth Doctor, "Blink"</font></p> </div>