Mars orbit of powerful computer spare keys

Approximately $ 720 million discovery is circling Mars orbit in March 2006, and the images broadcast home, and that more data on any other missions to the red planet combined. In the original spacecraft and the mission ended in 2008 is currently in mid-flight that is scheduled to begin in mid-2010.

Engineers are able to increase their rate of communication with the spacecraft, but I believe that some technical data on the precise terms of circuit behavior can occur as lost forever.

JPL spokesperson Guy Webster said NASA engineers are confident they can revive their safe space craft from sleep until Monday or Tuesday if all goes well. New problem appears not to have one that has plagued the same ship two times earlier this year, but it is something of JPL engineers have been seen earlier, he said.

Strong orbit Mars Explorer (MRO) suddenly switched to the redundant Side B computing subsystems, before the introduction of the protective safe mode on Thursday - the third computer problem this year for 4-year-old spacecraft which is currently under the mission.

"The ship is safe, with good temperatures and charged with battery and solar panels should face the sun," said Jim Erickson, project manager of NASA orbit jet propulsion laboratory (JPL) in Pasadena, calif. "The flight team is careful to take steps to return to normal operation."

In February and June unexpected circulatory Side A computer restarted it, send it in safe mode, while engineers on Earth worked to revive the office of the craft sector a few days. Engineers on issues related to the two hits of homeless cosmic rays or solar particles.

Safe Mode is a self-protective mechanism that allows the spacecraft to shut down and awaits instructions from Earth when it encounters a situation in which the functions of an independent board is not responsible for the mission managers said.