Of spacecraft, frogs and naps
21/01/14 05:28
I try to keep up with some of the news of space exploration. I grew up in a family that didn’t watch much television, but where the television was on non-stop when a space launch was about to take place. I had pictures of astronauts in my room and I still have my autographed portrait of Alan Shepard. I am among the minority of people who believe that he was misquoted when it comes to what may have been the first prayer ever uttered by a space traveler. You can google “Shepard’s Prayer” and you will get a different word than the way I say it: “Dear Lord, please don’t let me mess up.”
Actually there was quite a bit of theology in the early years of the space program. John Glenn, first US astronaut to orbit the planet was fond of saying, “Godspeed.” The crew of Apollo 8, the first humans to orbit the moon, read from Genesis during a live TV broadcast on Christmas Eve, 1968. Almost no one remembers that NASA got sued over that one. It was alleged that it was a violation of the establishment clause of the constitution. The Supreme Court ruled that it didn’t have jurisdiction since it occurred outside of the boundaries of the United States. In 1970, when Apollo 13 encountered life-threatening problems, President Nixon led the nation in prayer for the safe return of the astronauts. Pope John Paul II prayed for the spirits of the seven killed in the Challenger explosion.
If you have been following the news from space, however, there has been no news about the European comet-chaser Rosetta for months until yesterday. The spacecraft has been in hibernation for 31 months. It was all part of the plan. By allowing the craft to travel with its systems shut down, engineers were able to conserve battery power for the exciting things that are set to occur this year as the craft joins the orbit of Comet 67P. The comet has a second name, Churyumov-Gerasimenko, but I can never remember that name, so it is just 67P to me.
The controllers didn’t know exactly how long they would have to wait to hear a signal back from the spacecraft once they sent the signal for the craft to wake up. They figured they would allow an hour. In 45 minutes they had their answer. The spacecraft is performing as designed. Now controllers will fine-tune the trajectory of the spacecraft so it will rendezvous with the comet in August. In November it will deploy a small lander to the surface of the comet, which will return the first photographs from the surface of the comet. Then the spacecraft, lander and comet will continue toward the sun, passing inside of the orbit of the Earth and coming cosset to the Sun ion August of 2015.
It is an amazing exploration and an amazing feat of engineering.
So I know what you are thinking, “What does that have to do with frogs in Australia?” Funny you should bring that up. It has been raining in central Australia, a phenomenon that doesn’t happen every summer. Thunderstorms have drenched the ground and made the giant rock Uluru glisten with moisture. And there is an eerie sound coming from the area. Thousands of Sheep Frogs have emerged from their underground homes to begin breeding. I guess they really do sound like sheep, although no sheepherder would be fooled by the audio clip that ABC Australia has on its web site. The remarkable frogs have the ability to go underground and lie dormant for years, if necessary, waiting for the rains to come and when the rains come they emerge and the cycle of life begins again for them. New frogs are born and as the ground dries, they go underground and eventually become dormant to wait for their time to emerge.
There are plenty of examples in nature of creatures that use hibernation or dormancy to survive harsh conditions and to extend their lives until milder weather returns.
If you have ever observed a massive grizzly bear in the Bob Marshall in August, it is hard to believe that in February researchers would be able to crawl into her cave to weigh and tag her cubs, but that is exactly what they do. They don’t have to fear the 4-inch long claws of the mother bear because she sleeps through it all.
I can’t help but believe that the engineers who designed the Rosetta spacecraft didn’t get part of their idea from nature when making a ship that could go dormant and conserve energy.
I am also intrigued by the name they chose for their spacecraft. The Rosetta Stone is an inscribed rock, found in Egypt that has a decree of Ptolemy V inscribed in three languages: Egyptian hieroglyphs, Demotic script and Ancient Greek. Prior to the discovery of the stone archeologists were unable to read hieroglyphs. Using the information learned from the translations, they have been able to decode the meaning of other hieroglyphs.
Perhaps the spacecraft is able to make the connection between the lessons to be learned from giant hunks of ice orbiting the sun and the nature of the universe through which we are traveling. The spacecraft will be looking for clues to help us understand the nature of our universe.
Whether it be exploring the vast expanses of space or studying frogs that are normally very difficult to find burrowed beneath the surface, those who look closely at this universe discover amazing feats of resilience and small clues to the nature of this grand and glorious universe. It is, at its core, part of the quest of a grant theological question posed in Psalm 8: “When I consider thy heavens, the work of thy fingers, the moon and the stars, which thou hast ordained; what is man, that thou art mindful of him and the son of man, that thou visitest him?” “Who are we and what is our relationship to the creative force of the universe?”
Somewhere on the fringes of those grand questions is an observation about the role of dormancy in the grand scheme. Dormancy gives rise to resilience that allows things to live longer and survive harsher conditions.
So here, in the midst of a South Dakota winter, with work piling up all around, I seem to have the urge to take a nap. Who knows? It might make me more resilient.
Actually there was quite a bit of theology in the early years of the space program. John Glenn, first US astronaut to orbit the planet was fond of saying, “Godspeed.” The crew of Apollo 8, the first humans to orbit the moon, read from Genesis during a live TV broadcast on Christmas Eve, 1968. Almost no one remembers that NASA got sued over that one. It was alleged that it was a violation of the establishment clause of the constitution. The Supreme Court ruled that it didn’t have jurisdiction since it occurred outside of the boundaries of the United States. In 1970, when Apollo 13 encountered life-threatening problems, President Nixon led the nation in prayer for the safe return of the astronauts. Pope John Paul II prayed for the spirits of the seven killed in the Challenger explosion.
If you have been following the news from space, however, there has been no news about the European comet-chaser Rosetta for months until yesterday. The spacecraft has been in hibernation for 31 months. It was all part of the plan. By allowing the craft to travel with its systems shut down, engineers were able to conserve battery power for the exciting things that are set to occur this year as the craft joins the orbit of Comet 67P. The comet has a second name, Churyumov-Gerasimenko, but I can never remember that name, so it is just 67P to me.
The controllers didn’t know exactly how long they would have to wait to hear a signal back from the spacecraft once they sent the signal for the craft to wake up. They figured they would allow an hour. In 45 minutes they had their answer. The spacecraft is performing as designed. Now controllers will fine-tune the trajectory of the spacecraft so it will rendezvous with the comet in August. In November it will deploy a small lander to the surface of the comet, which will return the first photographs from the surface of the comet. Then the spacecraft, lander and comet will continue toward the sun, passing inside of the orbit of the Earth and coming cosset to the Sun ion August of 2015.
It is an amazing exploration and an amazing feat of engineering.
So I know what you are thinking, “What does that have to do with frogs in Australia?” Funny you should bring that up. It has been raining in central Australia, a phenomenon that doesn’t happen every summer. Thunderstorms have drenched the ground and made the giant rock Uluru glisten with moisture. And there is an eerie sound coming from the area. Thousands of Sheep Frogs have emerged from their underground homes to begin breeding. I guess they really do sound like sheep, although no sheepherder would be fooled by the audio clip that ABC Australia has on its web site. The remarkable frogs have the ability to go underground and lie dormant for years, if necessary, waiting for the rains to come and when the rains come they emerge and the cycle of life begins again for them. New frogs are born and as the ground dries, they go underground and eventually become dormant to wait for their time to emerge.
There are plenty of examples in nature of creatures that use hibernation or dormancy to survive harsh conditions and to extend their lives until milder weather returns.
If you have ever observed a massive grizzly bear in the Bob Marshall in August, it is hard to believe that in February researchers would be able to crawl into her cave to weigh and tag her cubs, but that is exactly what they do. They don’t have to fear the 4-inch long claws of the mother bear because she sleeps through it all.
I can’t help but believe that the engineers who designed the Rosetta spacecraft didn’t get part of their idea from nature when making a ship that could go dormant and conserve energy.
I am also intrigued by the name they chose for their spacecraft. The Rosetta Stone is an inscribed rock, found in Egypt that has a decree of Ptolemy V inscribed in three languages: Egyptian hieroglyphs, Demotic script and Ancient Greek. Prior to the discovery of the stone archeologists were unable to read hieroglyphs. Using the information learned from the translations, they have been able to decode the meaning of other hieroglyphs.
Perhaps the spacecraft is able to make the connection between the lessons to be learned from giant hunks of ice orbiting the sun and the nature of the universe through which we are traveling. The spacecraft will be looking for clues to help us understand the nature of our universe.
Whether it be exploring the vast expanses of space or studying frogs that are normally very difficult to find burrowed beneath the surface, those who look closely at this universe discover amazing feats of resilience and small clues to the nature of this grand and glorious universe. It is, at its core, part of the quest of a grant theological question posed in Psalm 8: “When I consider thy heavens, the work of thy fingers, the moon and the stars, which thou hast ordained; what is man, that thou art mindful of him and the son of man, that thou visitest him?” “Who are we and what is our relationship to the creative force of the universe?”
Somewhere on the fringes of those grand questions is an observation about the role of dormancy in the grand scheme. Dormancy gives rise to resilience that allows things to live longer and survive harsher conditions.
So here, in the midst of a South Dakota winter, with work piling up all around, I seem to have the urge to take a nap. Who knows? It might make me more resilient.