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American Morning

Interview With Michael Shara

Aired January 26, 2004 - 09:17   ET

THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.

THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.


BILL HEMMER, CNN ANCHOR: Well, suddenly it's a bit crowded on Mars with two spacecraft now on the planet. A safe landing early Sunday. Opportunity sending back more amazing snapshots of the Martian surface. Halfway across the red planet, the twin rover, Spirit, remains somewhat out of commission. NASA trying the resolve its technical problems.
And Michael Shara of the American Museum of Natural History here in New York City here with us on AMERICAN MORNING to talk about what we're learning so far.

Nice to see you, Mike.

MICHAEL SHARA, AMERICAN MUSEUM OF NATURAL HISTORY: Good morning.

HEMMER: Good morning.

I want to put this image back up from Opportunity.

SHARA: Sure.

HEMMER: As a scientist, what did you see in this that came in over the weekend?

SHARA: Well, we see, of course, that the spacecraft has landed safely and there's a lot of flattish ground, places where there aren't rocks and then outcroppings. We've been lucky enough, just spectacularly lucky enough to land inside a crater, which means that a backhoe has been there, a natural backhoe, namely a meteor, has cracked open or taken away a lot of the overlying soil and exposed some of the bedrock, some of those rocks in the background.

HEMMER: So why do you say, from a scientific perspective, why is it good to land in this crater?

SHARA: Because we've been able to get deeper underneath the soil and actually see some of the rocks down at the bottom.

HEMMER: What do you say to this response from over the weekend scoring a 300 million mile interplanetary hole in one? It's a mouthful. What does it mean?

SHARA: It, well, you really couldn't have done this if you had tried, to be able to pinpoint landing right inside a crater after all the gyrations of going through the atmosphere and popping open the parachute and then slowing. You really would not have been lucky enough or, you know, clever enough to have done it. But to have dropped right in there, right into this wonderful spot, is just phenomenal luck.

HEMMER: A couple of quick questions on Spirit.

Is there contact established? Will that rover be able to move again, rove?

SHARA: Yes, definitely. The contact...

HEMMER: You say that definitively.

SHARA: I'm sure of it. The NASA engineers have got a good handle on it. There don't seem to be any major hardware problems to stop it from moving. Now, it's just a matter of memory problems, perhaps software problems. I'm confident that those can be overcome.

HEMMER: Well, give me the logic for NASA to put two rovers on the planet at the same time. Do they work in concert together or not?

SHARA: They do in the sense that they're both trying to answer the same great scientific question. And you always worry about landing at a really peculiar place. It was as if you landed, you were a Martian and you landed on Earth right in the middle of the Sahara Desert. You might get the wrong answer about the nature of what's going on here on Earth.

On Mars, we want to know if there is water and hence the possibility of life.

HEMMER: A couple of things here, though. They have the ability to dig in the soil, right?

SHARA: Right.

HEMMER: How in the world do we know on planet Earth whether or not the soil composition is how they expect it to be or whether or not the readings will be accurate or not?

SHARA: Well, there are identical instruments on both of Spirit and Opportunity. And by firing things like alpha particles, x-rays and so on, you can get a return, you can get a signature, a kind of chemical fingerprint or DNA fingerprint, if you will, of the soil, see what the soil is made of and compare what it's made of on the two sides. You can also compare it with places like riverbeds on Earth and lake beds to see if the soil chemistry and minerals are the same as what we find in lakes on Earth.

HEMMER: So you're essentially getting an image back here on Earth that may lead scientists to prove one thing or the other?

SHARA: Well, that's right, and especially to see if there was water in abundance in the past.

HEMMER: I know you are very hot on that possibility here.

Can this answer that question definitively or is this just possibly another rung on that ladder, trying to determine that answer? SHARA: I would say this is two or three rungs. If we find that there is water there or has been water in abundance in the past, then the chances of life go up dramatically. It's not proof. We're not there yet.

HEMMER: Keep on enjoying it, OK?

SHARA: Right.

HEMMER: Michael Shara from the museum here in New York City, nice to see you.

SHARA: Thank you.

TO ORDER A VIDEO OF THIS TRANSCRIPT, PLEASE CALL 800-CNN-NEWS OR USE OUR SECURE ONLINE ORDER FORM LOCATED AT www.fdch.com







Aired January 26, 2004 - 09:17   ET
THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
BILL HEMMER, CNN ANCHOR: Well, suddenly it's a bit crowded on Mars with two spacecraft now on the planet. A safe landing early Sunday. Opportunity sending back more amazing snapshots of the Martian surface. Halfway across the red planet, the twin rover, Spirit, remains somewhat out of commission. NASA trying the resolve its technical problems.
And Michael Shara of the American Museum of Natural History here in New York City here with us on AMERICAN MORNING to talk about what we're learning so far.

Nice to see you, Mike.

MICHAEL SHARA, AMERICAN MUSEUM OF NATURAL HISTORY: Good morning.

HEMMER: Good morning.

I want to put this image back up from Opportunity.

SHARA: Sure.

HEMMER: As a scientist, what did you see in this that came in over the weekend?

SHARA: Well, we see, of course, that the spacecraft has landed safely and there's a lot of flattish ground, places where there aren't rocks and then outcroppings. We've been lucky enough, just spectacularly lucky enough to land inside a crater, which means that a backhoe has been there, a natural backhoe, namely a meteor, has cracked open or taken away a lot of the overlying soil and exposed some of the bedrock, some of those rocks in the background.

HEMMER: So why do you say, from a scientific perspective, why is it good to land in this crater?

SHARA: Because we've been able to get deeper underneath the soil and actually see some of the rocks down at the bottom.

HEMMER: What do you say to this response from over the weekend scoring a 300 million mile interplanetary hole in one? It's a mouthful. What does it mean?

SHARA: It, well, you really couldn't have done this if you had tried, to be able to pinpoint landing right inside a crater after all the gyrations of going through the atmosphere and popping open the parachute and then slowing. You really would not have been lucky enough or, you know, clever enough to have done it. But to have dropped right in there, right into this wonderful spot, is just phenomenal luck.

HEMMER: A couple of quick questions on Spirit.

Is there contact established? Will that rover be able to move again, rove?

SHARA: Yes, definitely. The contact...

HEMMER: You say that definitively.

SHARA: I'm sure of it. The NASA engineers have got a good handle on it. There don't seem to be any major hardware problems to stop it from moving. Now, it's just a matter of memory problems, perhaps software problems. I'm confident that those can be overcome.

HEMMER: Well, give me the logic for NASA to put two rovers on the planet at the same time. Do they work in concert together or not?

SHARA: They do in the sense that they're both trying to answer the same great scientific question. And you always worry about landing at a really peculiar place. It was as if you landed, you were a Martian and you landed on Earth right in the middle of the Sahara Desert. You might get the wrong answer about the nature of what's going on here on Earth.

On Mars, we want to know if there is water and hence the possibility of life.

HEMMER: A couple of things here, though. They have the ability to dig in the soil, right?

SHARA: Right.

HEMMER: How in the world do we know on planet Earth whether or not the soil composition is how they expect it to be or whether or not the readings will be accurate or not?

SHARA: Well, there are identical instruments on both of Spirit and Opportunity. And by firing things like alpha particles, x-rays and so on, you can get a return, you can get a signature, a kind of chemical fingerprint or DNA fingerprint, if you will, of the soil, see what the soil is made of and compare what it's made of on the two sides. You can also compare it with places like riverbeds on Earth and lake beds to see if the soil chemistry and minerals are the same as what we find in lakes on Earth.

HEMMER: So you're essentially getting an image back here on Earth that may lead scientists to prove one thing or the other?

SHARA: Well, that's right, and especially to see if there was water in abundance in the past.

HEMMER: I know you are very hot on that possibility here.

Can this answer that question definitively or is this just possibly another rung on that ladder, trying to determine that answer? SHARA: I would say this is two or three rungs. If we find that there is water there or has been water in abundance in the past, then the chances of life go up dramatically. It's not proof. We're not there yet.

HEMMER: Keep on enjoying it, OK?

SHARA: Right.

HEMMER: Michael Shara from the museum here in New York City, nice to see you.

SHARA: Thank you.

TO ORDER A VIDEO OF THIS TRANSCRIPT, PLEASE CALL 800-CNN-NEWS OR USE OUR SECURE ONLINE ORDER FORM LOCATED AT www.fdch.com