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Mariner 1 was the first spacecraft of the Mariner program. Intended to fly by Venus, it failed during launch on July 22, 1962. A hardware failure in an antenna caused the booster to lose contact with guidance systems on the ground, so an onboard computer assumed control. However, that computer's software contained a bug. Download high resolution version (512x640, 122 KB) File history Legend: (cur) = this is the current file, (del) = delete this old version, (rev) = revert to this old version. ...
Download high resolution version (512x640, 122 KB) File history Legend: (cur) = this is the current file, (del) = delete this old version, (rev) = revert to this old version. ...
Launch of Mariner 1 (NASA) The Mariner program was a program conducted by the American space agency NASA that launched a series of robotic interplanetary probes designed to investigate Mars, Venus and Mercury. ...
(*min temperature refers to cloud tops only) Atmospheric characteristics Atmospheric pressure 9. ...
is the 203rd day of the year (204th in leap years) in the Gregorian calendar. ...
Year 1962 (MCMLXII) was a common year starting on Monday (the link is to a full 1962 calendar) of the Gregorian calendar. ...
A Yagi-Uda beam antenna Short Wave Curtain Antenna (Moosbrunn, Austria) A building rooftop supporting numerous dish and sectored mobile telecommunications antennas (Doncaster, Victoria, Australia) An antenna is a transducer designed to transmit or receive radio waves which are a class of electromagnetic waves. ...
A guidance system is a device or group of devices used to navigate a ship, aircraft, missile, rocket, satellite, or other craft. ...
A computer bug is an error, flaw, mistake, failure, or fault in a computer program that prevents it from working as intended, or produces an incorrect result. ...
The error had occurred when an equation was being transcribed by hand in the specification for the guidance program. The writer missed the superscript bar in  (the nth smoothed value of the time derivative of a radius). Without the smoothing function indicated by the bar, the program treated normal minor variations of velocity as if they were serious, causing spurious corrections that sent the rocket off course. It was then destroyed by the Range Safety Officer. In the field of rocketry, a Range Safety Officer has responsibility for the safe transportation, storage and launch of rocket vehicles. ...
(It is sometimes claimed that the bug consisted a period typed in place of a comma, causing a FORTRAN statement of the form "DO 17 I = 1, 10" to be interpreted as "DO17I = 1.10" (an assignment to a variable called DO17I), since space characters are not significant in that language. There was in fact such a bug in a NASA orbit computation program at about this time, but it was a program for Project Mercury, not Mariner, and this bug was discovered before serious consequences occurred.) A full stop or period (sometimes stop, full point or dot), is the punctuation mark commonly placed at the end of several different types of sentences in English and many other languages. ...
For other uses, see Comma. ...
Fortran (previously FORTRAN[1]) is a general-purpose[2], procedural,[3] imperative programming language that is especially suited to numeric computation and scientific computing. ...
A space is a punctuation convention for providing interword separation in some scripts, including the Latin, Cyrillic, and Arabic. ...
The National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA) (IPA [ˈnæsə]) is an agency of the United States government, responsible for the nations public space program. ...
Project Mercury was the first human spaceflight program of the United States. ...
Launch of Mariner 1 (NASA) The Mariner program was a program conducted by the American space agency NASA that launched a series of robotic interplanetary probes designed to investigate Mars, Venus and Mercury. ...
The probe's mission was later completed by Mariner 2.-1...
Detailed Description
This was to be the first Mariner mission. It was intended to perform a Venus flyby. The vehicle was destroyed by the Range Safety Officer 293 seconds after launch at 09:26:16 UT when it veered off course. The booster had performed satisfactorily until an unscheduled yaw-lift (northeast) maneuver was detected by the range safety officer. Faulty application of the guidance commands made steering impossible and were directing the spacecraft towards a crash, possibly in the North Atlantic shipping lanes or in an inhabited area. The destruct command was sent 6 seconds before separation, after which the launch vehicle could not have been destroyed. The radio transponder continued to transmit signals for 64 seconds after the destruct command had been sent. For other uses, see Venus (disambiguation). ...
In orbital mechanics and aerospace engineering, a gravitational slingshot or gravity assist is the use of the gravity of a planet or other celestial body to alter the path and speed of a spacecraft. ...
For other uses, see Atlantic (disambiguation) The Atlantic Ocean is Earths second-largest ocean, covering approximately one-fifth of its surface. ...
A sea lane is regularly used route for ocean-going vessels. ...
The failure was apparently caused by a combination of two factors. Improper operation of the Atlas airborne beacon equipment resulted in a loss of the rate signal from the vehicle for a prolonged period. The airborne beacon used for obtaining rate data was inoperative for four periods ranging from 1.5 to 61 seconds in duration. Additionally, the Mariner 1 Post Flight Review Board determined that the omission of a hyphen in coded computer instructions in the data-editing program allowed transmission of incorrect guidance signals to the spacecraft. During the periods the airborne beacon was inoperative the omission of the hyphen in the data-editing program caused the computer to incorrectly accept the sweep frequency of the ground receiver as it sought the vehicle beacon signal and combined this data with the tracking data sent to the remaining guidance computation. This caused the computer to swing automatically into a series of unnecessary course corrections with erroneous steering commands which finally threw the spacecraft off course. This article is about the punctuation mark. ...
Spacecraft and Subsystems The Mariner 1 spacecraft was identical to Mariner 2, launched 27 August 1962. Mariner 1 consisted of a hexagonal base, 1.04 meters across and 0.36 meters thick, which contained six magnesium chassis housing the electronics for the science experiments, communications, data encoding, computing, timing, and attitude control and the power control, battery, and battery charger, as well as the attitude control gas bottles and the rocket engine. On top of the base was a tall pyramid-shaped mast on which the science experiments were mounted which brought the total height of the spacecraft to 3.66 meters. Attached to either side of the base were rectangular solar panel wings with a total span of 5.05 meters and width of 0.76 meters. Attached by an arm to one side of the base and extending below the spacecraft was a large directional dish antenna. is the 239th day of the year (240th in leap years) in the Gregorian calendar. ...
Year 1962 (MCMLXII) was a common year starting on Monday (the link is to a full 1962 calendar) of the Gregorian calendar. ...
A regular hexagon A hexagon (also known as sexagon) is a polygon with six edges and six vertices. ...
metre or meter, see meter (disambiguation) The metre is the basic unit of length in the International System of Units. ...
General Name, symbol, number magnesium, Mg, 12 Chemical series alkaline earth metals Group, period, block 2, 3, s Appearance silvery white solid at room temp Standard atomic weight 24. ...
// In the context of spacecraft, attitude control is control of the angular position and rotation of the spacecraft, either relative to the object that it is orbiting, or relative to the celestial sphere. ...
For other meanings, see pyramid (disambiguation). ...
A photovoltaic module is composed of individual PV cells. ...
The Mariner 1 power system consisted of the two solar cell wings, one 183 cm by 76 cm and the other 152 cm by 76 cm (with a 31 cm dacron extension (a solar sail) to balance the solar pressure on the panels) which powered the craft directly or recharged a 1000 Watt-hour sealed silver-zinc cell battery, which was to be used before the panels were deployed, when the panels were not illuminated by the Sun, and when loads were heavy. A power-switching and booster regulator device controlled the power flow. Communications consisted of a 3 Watt transmitter capable of continuous telemetry operation, the large high gain directional dish antenna, a cylindrical omnidirectional antenna at the top of the instrument mast, and two command antennas, one on the end of either solar panel, which received instructions for midcourse maneuvers and other functions. The term plastics covers a range of synthetic or semi-synthetic organic condensation or polymerization products that can be molded or extruded into objects or films or fibers. ...
Sol redirects here. ...
An omnidirectional antenna is an antenna system which radiates power uniformly in all directions. ...
Propulsion for midcourse maneuvers was supplied by a monopropellant (anhydrous hydrazine) 225 N retro-rocket. The hydrazine was ignited using nitrogen tetroxide and aluminum oxide pellets, and thrust direction was controlled by four jet vanes situated below the thrust chamber. Attitude control with a 1 degree pointing error was maintained by a system of nitrogen gas jets. The Sun and Earth were used as references for attitude stabilization. Overall timing and control was performed by a digital Central Computer and Sequencer. Thermal control was achieved through the use of passive reflecting and absorbing surfaces, thermal shields, and movable louvers. A (usually liquid) rocket propellant that can be used by itself, without the need for a second component. ...
Hydrazine is the chemical compound with formula N2H4. ...
For other uses, see Newton (disambiguation). ...
Nitrogen tetroxide (or Dinitrogen tetroxide) (N2O4) is a hypergolic propellant often used in combination with a hydrazine-based rocket fuel. ...
Aluminium oxide (or aluminum oxide) (Al2O3) is a chemical compound of aluminium and oxygen. ...
From left to right, flat, round nose, hollow point and pointed pellets. ...
This article describes the unit of angle. ...
General Name, symbol, number nitrogen, N, 7 Chemical series nonmetals Group, period, block 15, 2, p Appearance colorless gas Standard atomic weight 14. ...
The scientific experiments were mounted on the instrument mast and base. A magnetometer was attached to the top of the mast below the omnidirectional antenna. Particle detectors were mounted halfway up the mast, along with the cosmic ray detector. A cosmic dust detector and solar plasma spectrometer detector were attached to the top edges of the spacecraft base. A microwave radiometer and an infrared radiometer and the radiometer reference horns were rigidly mounted to a 48 cm diameter parabolic radiometer antenna mounted near the bottom of the mast. A magnetometer is a scientific instrument used to measure the strength and/or direction of the magnetic field in the vicinity of the instrument. ...
Cosmic rays can loosely be defined as energetic particles originating outside of the Earth. ...
“Space dust†redirects here. ...
Spectrometer A spectrometer is an optical instrument used to measure properties of light over a specific portion of the electromagnetic spectrum, typically used in spectroscopic analysis to identify materials. ...
This article is about the type of Electromagnetic radiation. ...
A radiometer is a device used to measure the radiant flux or power in electromagnetic radiation. ...
For other uses, see Infrared (disambiguation). ...
A parabola A parabola (from the Greek: παραβολή) is a conic section generated by the intersection of a cone, and a plane tangent to the cone or parallel to some plane tangent to the cone. ...
In addition, a small 91 cm × 150 cm (3 feet × 5 feet) United States flag was folded and stowed on board Mariner 1 (and Mariner 2) before it was mated to the Agena.
Total research, development, launch, and support costs for the Mariner series of spacecraft (Mariners 1 through 10) was approximately $554 million.
External links - NASA's Article about the Mariner I
- Mariner 1 Mission Profile by NASA's Solar System Exploration
- RISKS Digest detail about the Mariner I failure
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