Could somebody transcribe just the little bit where Steve is talking about a fantasy landing of a third MER somewhere in the Vallis Marineris?  There's a lot of noise and I'm not sure what he's saying.

"...Valles Chasma, you know down in the Valles Marinaris.  That one is reeeeeally tempting.  That would have been a good one. whhoooba  thumpa-thumpa  whooooo fududafudafuda whoopa whoopa boom boom whoosh whoosh..."

I hope that helps.

Melas Chasma. That was mine! I actually feel a bit guilty for having edged some of the better questions out cos I was kinda anticipating Melas as an answer.

I have most of the MER press briefings <and landing> on VHS and the most recent one on DVD-R.  I intend to transfer all to DVD and hope to make them available. 

Wonderful interview, nice work Doug!

The winning question was the S1K bug, simply because Steve and I both joked about it - and as dot.dk already has a copy of the book, he's kindly donated it back to UMSF

I want to raise money to send down to help with Katrina clear up - so your call guys - do we do some sort of raffle - 50 tickets at 50 pence a go to raise a guarenteed £25, or do I put it on ebay and the best bid wins?

Doug

I want to raise money to send down to help with Katrina clear up - so your call guys - do we do some sort of raffle - 50 tickets at 50 pence a go to raise a guarenteed £25, or do

There is another way to investigate Mars and the full range of delights and discoveries this heterogeneous planet holds for us.  My most persistent emotion in working with the Viking lander pictures was frustration at our immobility.  I found myself unconsciously urging the spacecraft at least to stand on its tiptoes, as if this laboratory, designed for immobility, were perversely refusing to manage even a little hop.  How we longed to poke that dune with the sample arm, look for life beneath that rock, see if that distant ridge was a crater rampart.  And not so very far to the southeast, I knew, were the four sinuous channels of Chryse.  For all the tantalizing and provocative character of the Viking results, I know of a hundred places on Mars which are far more interesting than our landing sites.  The ideal tool is a roving vehicle carrying on advanced experiments, particularly in imaging, chemistry, and biology.  Prototypes of such rovers are under development by NASA.  They know on their own how to go over rocks, how not to fall down ravines, how to get out of tight spots.  It is within our capability to land a rover on Mars that could scan its surroundings, see the most interesting place in its field of view and, by the same time tomorrow, be there.  Every day a new place, a complex, winding traverse over the varied topography of this appealing planet.

Such a mission would reap enormous scientific benefits, even if there is no life on Mars.  We could wander down the ancient river valleys, up the slopes of one of the great volcanic mountains, along the strange stepped terrain of the icy polar terraces, or muster a closer approach to the beckoning pyramids of Mars.  Public interest in such a mission would be sizable.  Every day a new set of vistas would arrive on our home television screens.  We could trace the route, ponder the findings, suggest new destinations.  The journey would be long, the rover obedient to radio commands from Earth.  There would be plenty of time for good new ideas to be incorporated into the mission plan.  A billion people could participate in the exploration of another world.

I finally got some free time today and listened to the interview.  Like everyone else, I thought Doug did a great job - thanks for doing it!

Towards the end, when asked about Carl Sagan, Steve mentioned that someone sent him an e-mail with a quote from Cosmos about a future rover mission.  I cracked my copy open and think I found the passage - hopefully I transcribed it correctly.  Have a read, it's very prophetic...

Excerpt from Cosmos by Carl Sagan (1980), “Blues for a Red Planet”, pp. 129-130:

Melas Chasma, you know, down in the Valles Marineris, that was really tempting. That would have been a good one. Its a scary site because a lot of it's covered by sand dunes, like 30% of that site was covered with sand dunes and you come down on the dunes, man, you're screwed. But, it would have been spectacular topography, and really cool layered rocks, so that would have been a good one.