**update** 8.02 pm The Phoenix Has Landed, and so far, all is well. When Ben makes the recording available, I will post it in place of the live stream player so you can relive the event.
Replay of event:
Here is my preferred viewing for all things NASA, Space Vid Cast:
Phoenix is scheduled to touch down on the northern icy plains of Mars tonight. Confirmation of the landing could come as early as 7:53 p.m. EDT (4:53 p.m. PDT). Follow along on here during landing, the live coverage is expected to begin at 6pm. Until then, I have a few websites for you to peruse. Remember that Mars is about 15 Light Minutes away, so we won't know what happens on Mars until 15 minutes later.
Phoenix Website
University of Arizona Website
**update** 5.21pm Phoenix is even on "Twitter". Gag me with a spoon!
Time table (All Times pm Eastern)
7.16.00 Propulsion System Pressurization
7.39.17 Cruise Stage Separation
7.46.17 Enter Martian Atmosphere
7.49.57 Parachute Deploy
7.50.12 Heat Shield Jettison
7.52.50 Lander Separation
7.52.53 Descent thrusters Increase
7.53.33 Touchdown
Just remember, that we will have to wait for the radio signals to get from Mars to the Earth, and that will take several minutes.
Today's snapshot of the Solar System as viewed from above:
Mars is red, and the Earth is blue Venus is white, Mercury is green, and the Sun is yellow in this picture. Photo courtesy Solar System Live.
Mars is about 171,400,000 miles from Earth, and since light travels at just over 186,000 miles per second...it will take the messages 921 seconds, or 15 and a third minutes to get here. This is also why most everything taking place on the lander is automated. There is no way we could course correct in time. If there were astronauts on this lander...they would have to wait over 30 minutes for a reply! That should give you an idea of how truly vast space is, and how tiny we are, and how far we have to go in the exploration of the universe.
Other places with live coverage on the internet may be found at NASA TV, Green Banks Telescope, and CNN Live w/ Miles O'Brien.
Here is a quick video update via youtube:
Here is a video of the launch of Phoenix, nine months ago:
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