Keith and Derrick Pitts, “Countdown” contributor and chief astronomer for Philadelphia’s Franklin Institute, discuss the new Mars rover, Curiosity and its laser attachment, as well as the chance the Earth germs may have hitched a ride on improperly-sterilized equipment.
KEITH OLBERMANN: “War of the Worlds,” “Mars Attacks,” The “Looney Toons” episodes featuring Marvin the Martian — all of these focus on the danger of an attack from Martians.
In our number-one story — it appears we’ve struck first, by sending a plutonium-powered laser to Mars, along with biological weapons. Kinda. Maybe. Which can mean only one thing — we have declared war on Mars.
On Saturday, an unmanned Atlas V rocket, carrying what is officially known as the Mars Science Laboratory, took off — just ahead of that bird. One piece of the laboratory is the rover named Curiosity. The ten-foot-high, one-ton rover is the most technologically-advanced piece of equipment ever sent to Mars. Curiosity is too heavy to use air bags to land, as its predecessors had. So instead, the rover will have to be lowered gently to the surface using jet packs. Wow, like “Jetsons” and things.
Once on the surface, it will study Mars using an on-board weather station, a jackhammer, and tools for studying stuff, like soil. The rover also contains an instrument known as the ChemCam, which we would call a “shark with frickin’ laser beams attached to its head.”
The ChemCam’s pinhead-sized laser beam contains as much power as a million light bulbs and shoots in five one-billionths of a second, which is bad news for any pinhead-sized aliens who might get in the way. The laser is designed to vaporize Martian rock, turning it into an ionized gas, resulting in a flash of light. The ChemCam then uses a spectrometer to record the wavelength of the light emitted. Different chemical elements emit different wavelengths of light, so scientist will be able to determine the chemical makeup of Mars. Or — in other words —
(Movie clip of a planet exploding)
On that note, let’s bring in Derrick Pitts, “Countdown” contributor and chief astronomer at the Franklin Institute in Philadelphia. Good evening, sir.
DERRICK PITTS: How are you?
OLBERMANN: I was just thinking about that, as I heard that description of — of the — the — what it can do to Martian rocks, this laser. A 10-foot-high, one-ton, nuclear-powered laser. It’s exactly the kind of weapon that Marvin the Martian had in the Marvin the Martian — Bugs Bunny — cartoons only we’re using it on them. Are we attacking Mars?
PITTS: We have to look on the back for the label that says “ACME Rocket Company,” to see if — where it’s from.
OLBERMANN: ACME Intergalactic Rocket Company, yeah.
PITTS: That’s — that’s the one. This is a remarkable piece of equipment. It is huge. This is like the Humvee of planetary rovers, it’s such a big piece of equipment. And so well-equipped. But this is the next step for NASA scientists to try to figure out whether or not Mars has ever had an environment where it may have been possible for life to develop. So, this is a really great piece of equipment that’s going to help us understand so much more than we did before.
OLBERMANN: Yeah but, the bottom line still is — we go someplace new and we start destroying it. Didn’t we learn anything about Earth?
PITTS: Well, the thing about this is that — the way that we go about this, actually, is to just get little, tiny samples, and from those little, tiny samples be able to do a lot of analysis.
You know, the point is that we don’t really want to try to do very much destructive stuff on Mars at all. We’re not really trying to harm the planet at all but, if we can just get a little bit of sample material that we can analyze, that’ll help us tell an awful lot. And the instruments that are being used are so, so excellent that they really can use a very small sample amount to tell us what we need to know.
OLBERMANN: Yeah, you know what? Tomorrow, they’ll be fracking on Mars and then they’ll have these cute — these cute college kids saying, “Oh, maybe it’s a good thing” in the ads on Martian — Martian TV.
PITTS: And can I sell you some shares in the mines that I’m going to establish there?
OLBERMANN: Hey, in a thousand years — I wouldn’t be a bit surprised. Back to the rover. All right, I’ll put away my complaints for a second. Is it microbial life? Is it — is it only the environmental suitability of life? What could it actually tell us?
PITTS: Yeah, the story is that we’re trying to figure out whether or not the planet, in some locations — in the particular location where it’s going, called Gale Crater, it’s about a 100-mile wide-crater — we’re trying to figure out if this might have been a place where there was an environment that could have been conducive the to the development of life.
It’s really important, Keith, that this process be done in very small steps — very accurate steps — to make sure that we don’t jump to any conclusions about what could have been on Mars or what still could be, because another objective is to try to see if there is an environment present today that would allow life to develop.
OLBERMANN: All right — speaking of microbial life, they revealed today that project developers may not have properly sterilized some drill bits aboard Curiosity. They might have Earth germs on them — a very small chance of it, but it’s possible. Is — is that, like, the beginning of — of the end of potential life on Mars going forward because, you know, it’s — that’s how, as I recall, that’s how we killed all — the Martians off in the documentary “The War of the Worlds,” when the Martians came here and caught colds and died in Los Angeles.
PITTS: And we were very effective at getting rid of them that way.
OLBERMANN: Right.
PITTS: Well, in this case — if we want to talk about contamination of Mars — this particular spacecraft is — has been — better sterilized than any of the other spacecraft we have sent to Mars in the history of our exploration. So, if there was some contamination that was gonna be done by a spacecraft we sent to Mars, it would’ve happened by the other spacecraft we’ve already sent there.
So, we can talk about the chance of that contamination being higher than it would be if we had actually done the sterilization properly but the real chance of that happening is pretty much slim to none.
OLBERMANN: Right —
PITTS: Of course, that remains to be seen.
OLBERMANN: Right, when the giant, 26-foot-tall microbe comes around the corner and eats the — the rover, you’ll — you’ll — I’ll have the last laugh on that one.
PITTS: And then comes back home.
OLBERMANN: Yeah, takes their — that’s it — takes the ship back and — and it heads for home, yeah.
What’s with all the jet packs? Is this all of the jet packs we were promised — they’re being used to land this damn thing?
PITTS: I really hope that one of the spinoffs that comes out of this — out of this project, actually — is those jet packs that we were promised. Where’s mine? So, this is — this is a really interesting and exciting way to do this. It’s gonna be an exciting thing to see — come next August, when it actually happens — to see how these jet packs actually lower this big craft.
OLBERMANN: And the video we just showed — of the jet pack — looked exactly like the one that they blew around at the 1964-65 New York City World’s Fair, so there ya go.
PITTS: Yep. There’s the tech.
OLBERMANN: The — the chief — it’s advanced so much in the interim — the chief astronomer at the Franklin Institute in Philadelphia, and good sport and “Countdown” contributor, Derrick Pitts. As ever, great thanks for your time, Derrick.
PITTS: I’ll give you a ride in my jet pack, when I get it.
OLBERMANN: Thank you kindly, we’ll go —
PITTS: Thank you.
OLBERMANN: Hunting for microbes.
