Sir Arthur C. Clarke Cracks
The Tip of the Mars Iceberg
YOWUSA.COM, 28-March-01
Steve Russell
…Continued
And Then a Probe Phones Home
After the loss of the MPL, NASA publicly listened for signals that might indicate a sign of life.
CNN, January 27 2000
Faint whisper from Mars could be lost lander
NASA will send commands to the Mars Polar Lander again Thursday after a mysterious faint signal was picked up by a radio dish at Stanford University the day before.
CNN, February 16 2000
NASA says faint signals most likely not from Polar Lander
Scientists waiting for a call from the lost Mars Polar Lander may have heard a wrong number.
But Who Was It Calling?
All the above evidence reported so far was like an Indian smoke signal coming from the burning fire atop the mountain. These signals led Marshall Masters on a private investigation to find this fire.
The Millennium Group, May 7 2000
Mars and July 2000 - Knowledge Denied
All of this has brought me to the following conclusions:
-
The truth about Mars, if known, would have a profound impact on our civilization. Which in turn could threaten existing power structures at the highest levels.
-
Like much of the Hubble Space Telescope imagery is intentionally classified and withheld from the public that funds it. Those in power are deciding what is in our best
interest, which of course mirrors their own.
-
The Mars Climate Orbiter and the Mars Polar Lander crashes were planned cover-ups. The benefit of this cover-up is that none of the data from these public probes (which
everyone thinks have been destroyed) will have to be published and is therefore secretly controlled.
-
The Mars Climate Orbiter and the Mars Polar Lander are safely parked in a low orbit around Mars and are no longer under NASA control. A programming fluke did not kill
them. Rather, a programming oversight almost allowed a secondary onboard system to reveal the new owners had stolen the craft from NASA.
-
We will never be allowed to see the events [76P] coming in July 2000.
-
There is life on Mars!
From the best available data at the time, the article raised the possibility that the National Reconnaissance Office (NRO) was responsible for
hijacking the two spacecraft. It was also presumed that the US Space Command was now responsible for monitoring and controlling the crafts since their capabilities exceed that of NASA.
If the measurement mistakes during the MCO loss and inadequate testing of the MPL are both cover stories, another agency must be behind the acquisition of this powerful technology. But how could anyone hijack a
spacecraft?
How To Hijack a Spacecraft 101
Marshall once worked as a contractor to Lockheed, and one of his primary responsibilities
 was documenting the entire communication process from
the ground to a vehicle in space. In this particular case, it was a commercial mapping satellite based on the KH1 spy satellite.
Space vehicles and their ground controllers do not send messages in the clear (unencrypted) unless there is an absolute emergency. All messages
are encrypted using sophisticated software keys. If the key is changed, the signal is recognizable as being man-made, but is indecipherable to anyone who does not posses the correct key.
What Marshall has suggested in his article, was that the encryption keys for both Mars probes were changed without NASA's knowledge so that an
intelligence agency could observe the 76P fly-by of Mars. Keep in mind, the loss of the two Mars probes was primarily a loss of communication.
The actual destruction of either probe has never actually been confirmed by anyone. In essence, the probes are still "missing in action".
The key to understanding how a spacecraft could dial a "wrong number", lies in a piece of electronic equipment known as a Front End Processor
(FEP). All communications between ground controllers and orbiting spacecraft is achieved through the FEP. The FEP is responsible for processing communications from the digital ground software through to
the analogue wave signal broadcast to the spacecraft. The FEP also handles the encryption and decryption of the signal using special keys
similar to that used for processing credit card information over the Internet.
If the secondary backup system on the MPL spacecraft were to override the primary system using a different encryption key, NASA would hear a signal but it would appear as a "wrong number" since they could not
decipher the message. Subsequently, they believed it could not have come from the spacecraft. However, it did come from the direction of
Mars, meaning that only those with the new key would be able to control the spacecraft.
The MPL was originally designed to communicate with the MCO to relay information back to Earth. Was the software "fix" that delayed the MCO
used to install a new communications protocol that NASA was unaware of? If the NRO was in possession of the MCO, then data could be sent back from the MPL using this new protocol and eliminating the need to
use NASA's Mars Global Surveyor (MGS) satellite currently orbiting Mars.
Perhaps someone at NASA or in some other dark and dusty corner of the government read Marshall's article, because what happened next is a strange coincidence.
Finding The Impossible
Shortly after the loss of the MPL in December 1999, NASA decided to contact the National Imagery and Mapping Agency (NIMA) with the hope of finding the MPL somewhere on Mars.
 The NIMA is a combat support agency of the
Department of Defence (DOD) that obtains their data through the services of the NRO. The NIMA routinely support the operations of top-secret US national security spacecraft, they understand the
meaning of the word "classified".
The NIMA have since been quietly scanning images from the existing MGS Orbiter looking for the MPL. Under normal circumstances, this exercise would never have
been undertaken. They should have already known that this search would be futile.
Malin Space Science Systems, July 4 1998
Mars Pathfinder First Anniversary Special
This picture - at about 5 meters per pixel - is the best available for the site. The previous best images were from the Viking 1 Orbiter in 1976, and had a resolution of about 38
meters per pixel.
The MOC image has allowed scientists to determine the exact location of the Mars Pathfinder Lander. Unfortunately, the image resolution is not good enough to actually see the Lander.
Before the NIMA really sank their teeth into the task of finding the MPL, NASA first decided to image the Mars Pathfinder with increased resolutions in an attempt to show that a detailed search would prove
useful.
Compared to the MPL, Pathfinder was to be a much easier target to acquire because it has a precisely known location and several distinct surrounding landmarks to help in determining an accurate position.
The question was "Could the Mars Global Surveyors 1.5 meter per pixel camera be used to spot a tiny spacecraft at an unknown location?" The answer was a resounding NO!
Malin Space Science Systems, January 24 2000
MOC's Highest Resolution View of Mars Pathfinder Landing Site
The results of this effort to find Mars Pathfinder… shows that while the landing site of Mars Pathfinder can be identified, the Lander itself cannot be seen. It is too small to be
resolved in an image where each pixel acquired by the MOC covers a square of 1.5 meters to a side, given the contrast conditions on Mars and the MOCs ability to discriminate
contrast. At this scale, Pathfinder is not much larger than two pixels, and the same is true of the lost Polar Lander.
This effort to photograph the Mars Pathfinder Lander demonstrates that it is extremely difficult to find a Lander on the surface of Mars using the Mars Orbiter aboard the MGS spacecraft.
Despite the impossibility that the NIMA were presented with, they insist that they have been searching for the MPL during the last 14 months. Why
would this super-secret agency bother wasting such precious time on such a hopeless task? Perhaps it is because they have access to supplementary data from the "lost" MCO and maybe even better
resolution imagery. If you are going to send a camera all the way to Mars, why send a Kodak Pocket Instamatic?
Something From Nothing Is Still Nothing
In a recent exclusive report from Space.Com, sources close to the search have reported that the MPL may have actually been found despite all previous failures.
Space.Com, March 19 2001
EXCLUSIVE: Spy Agency May Have Located Mars Polar Lander
NASA contacted NIMA within a few weeks of the lander's failure, said Edward Weiler, head of NASA's Office of Space Science.
"Shortly after the loss of Mars Polar Lander, NIMA and NASA began working together analyszing images of the intended landing site and to try to locate the spacecraft," said
Jennifer Lafley, a NIMA spokeswoman.
"At this point, the results of this study are not conclusive, and the agencies are working together on resolving a number of technical questions," Lafley said.
According to a SPACE.com source familiar with the search underway, euphoric NIMA experts believe they have identified the Mars Polar Lander. Furthermore, the source said that the
Lander appears intact on the surface, sitting atop its trio of landing legs.
It does not matter how advanced your image analysis software is. The public MOC images do not contain enough resolution to see something as
small as the Pathfinder or the MPL. A single pixel represents nothing but a shade of grey. The two or three pixels that formulate the MPL represent
nothing more than two or three shades of grey, very different from an entire spacecraft with noticeable landing legs and orientation.
Perhaps this inside leak was designed to let us know that the NIMA have known its location all along. How else could they claim to have identified
the two correct pixels in a haystack of millions? If, as we initially suspected, the NRO has control of the MPL and MCO, then they certainly
would have access to special information detailing exactly where it is.
The NIMA stated that it was "technical questions" that needed resolving, not technical problems or technical issues. Could the "technical questions" they are trying to answer, in fact be answers to questions the
public is going to ask? Like, how on Earth did you manage to find the MPL in only two pixels?
|
