Super Tuesday

   Photo: NASA - JPL

TIRED:  Some not-so-good news from Mars this morning. 

I'll let NASA tell you what's up, per their press release.  

A routine check of the aluminum wheels on NASA’s Curiosity Mars rover has found two small breaks on the rover’s left middle wheel—the latest sign of wear and tear as the rover continues its journey, now approaching the 10-mile (16 kilometer) mark.
The mission's first and second breaks in raised treads, called grousers, appeared in a March 19 image check of the wheels, documenting that these breaks occurred after the last check, on Jan. 27. 

"All six wheels have more than enough working lifespan remaining to get the vehicle to all destinations planned for the mission," said Curiosity Project Manager Jim Erickson at NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory, Pasadena, California. "While not unexpected, this damage is the first sign that the left middle wheel is nearing a wheel-wear milestone,"

The monitoring of wheel damage on Curiosity, plus a program of wheel-longevity testing on Earth, was initiated after dents and holes in the wheels were seen to be accumulating faster than anticipated in 2013. Testing showed that at the point when three grousers on a wheel have broken, that wheel has reached about 60 percent of its useful life. Curiosity already has driven well over that fraction of the total distance needed for reaching the key regions of scientific interest on Mars' Mount Sharp.

So, clearly not great news about the wheels' status, and the photos tell the story. In case you're wondering, each of Curiosity's six wheels is about 20 inches (50 centimeters) in diameter and 16 inches (40 centimeters) wide, milled out of solid aluminum. (I can't help but think aluminium is super light for the trip to Mars, but maybe too lightweight for the surface of Mars.)

Curiosity's wheels' treads that hit the surface of Mars are about half as thick as a U.S. dimes. 

As alarming as these photos look to me, NASA scientists seem to be taking it in stride, or tread, as the case may be. ... 

Curiosity Project Scientist Ashwin Vasavada, also at JPL, said, "This is an expected part of the life cycle of the wheels and at this point does not change our current science plans or diminish our chances of studying key transitions in mineralogy higher on Mount Sharp."

Overall, through March 20, 2017, Curiosity has driven 9.9 miles (16.0 kilometers) since the mission's August 2012 landing on Mars. I remember reading about tire worries yeaers ago, and for the past four years, rover drive planners have used enhanced methods of mapping potentially hazardous terrains to reduce the pace of damage from sharp, embedded rocks along the rover's route.

Below is a photo I took of a copy of Curiosity's wheel when I was fortunate enough to attend a Tweetup during Mars Science Laboratory's launch.

As you can see, it's so much bigger and different that the wheels that went before it. (MSL's wheel is far left. It's previous rovers' wheels are left to right.)

TECH TALES: So, a couple of nights ago, along about midnight, we received an email about an opportunity to participate in a group at Pacific Science Center. Honestly, that was all I needed to read before I started furiously typing to sign up, as it was a super small study group, it's a big city and we wanted in!

Fortunately, we were accepted into the study, and tonight was our first get together. For five evenings in upcoming weeks, we'll be working on a pilot program that involves robotics, storytelling and art. What's not to love?!

The program is funded by the National Science Foundation, and it's a collaboration that involves PacSci and the University of Washington. Not a bad pedigree.

Tonight was our first session.

 We got to play around with Scratch programming and a Hummingbird motherboard.

The goal of this project is for us to tell a family story in a diorama using technology/robotics. After our first meeting, we hit upon a theme we all were immediately excited about. 

Stay tuned for further developments. 

SOMETHING FISHY: Today, Annabelle and I headed north and east toward the University of Washington surplus store. There was only one problem: We got there about two hours before it opened. Oops. 

So, we headed back. On our way home, we noticed a bunch of balloons outside the Ivar's restaurant under the Ship Canal Bridge. Annabelle said she saw something about it being Ivar's birthday, and that made me recall I'd read something about that being a big/good deal. I pulled over, Googled it, and we turned around.

Um, yeah, good deal - and worth doubling back for! 

So the kids had an awesome lunch - complete with special mango cheesecake desserts, cause we stumbled upon it so early. 

So, happy birthday to a Northwest icon, and what a nice surprise for us!