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Phoenix Lander: Rest in Peace

Just a real brief entry tonight, and a nice little change of pace from my political ramblings. The Phoenix Lander, which landed on Mars in May and has yielded a wealth of scientific information about the Red Planet, has died due to prolonged lack of sunlight.

Phoenix gathered the first concrete evidence of water on Mars, but had been (intentionally) landed near the Martian poles where sunlight is scarce (but water is, apparently, abundant). After several months of successful operation, the probe finally fell victim to the Martian winter and has stopped communicating with earth.

Some of the scientific data gathered by Phoenix is still being processed, and there may be more groundbreaking discoveries yet to be announced, but the probe itself will likely never be heard from again.

Scott Bradford has been putting his opinions on his website since 1995—before most people knew what a website was. He has been a professional web developer in the public- and private-sector for over twenty years. He is an independent constitutional conservative who believes in human rights and limited government, and a Catholic Christian whose beliefs are summarized in the Nicene Creed. He holds a bachelor’s degree in Public Administration from George Mason University. He loves Pink Floyd and can play the bass guitar . . . sort-of. He’s a husband, pet lover, amateur radio operator, and classic AMC/Jeep enthusiast.