NASA scientists watched the Genesis space capsule tumble out of the sky and plunge into the desert at 193 mph near the Army's Dugway Proving Ground in Utah.

The impact smashed open the science capsule, exposing its precious scientific cargo to contamination.

But scientists were cautiously optimistic that the payload -- dozens of fragile tiles that had collected particles of the solar wind for about two years -- could still yield viable material.

"Certain elements of the design should help piece the science together," said Andrew Dantzler, NASA's solar system division director. "We don't know the condition of the collectors that hold the science. We'll be learning that in the hours, days, weeks to come."

Yeah, because sending a piece of metal to the sun and back is really easy.

i bet you $100 to do it.

~grabs a gun and shoots down the balloon.

Hey I dont care, its your tax money paying for it ;P

Let's not forget the multitudes of mars landers and orbiters that have succumbed to some odd engineering mistake or another...

NASA needs to get their act together; their success rate in the last decade or so is abysmal.

and how is that you still hold your job ??? !!!!

and of course its SO easy to build a machine that will work FLAWLESSLY after being launched off the earth, hurtled thru space, plopped down on another planet and driven around. of course.

no more of this "cheaper" crap.

They can operate on the same budget properly, they just have to run less missions.

it's not just "mars rovers", it's everything.

It's orbitals, collectors, telescopes, space station bits, shuttle launches, rovers...

I mean, think of how much NASA was doing back in the '60s when it was fully funded. A manned rocket launch every year or two? Now NASA has a fraction of that funding, and they're undertaking all sorts of ambitious projects!

Exactly. Don't even get me going on the Superconducting Supercollider. What good is 30% of an unfinished SSC, hmm, Congress? Asspilots.

--Colin

Anti....Terrorist....training.......... camp?  What the FUCK do we need that for?

fiber optic , what is your job ?

Microfabrication Engineer

ok , but what does your job consist of ?

Homeland Security Buyer's Guide? What is all this? The SCC site had better not ever become anything that isn't a particle collider. 20 TeV/beam is sufficient to create a Higgs boson, damn it!

--Colin

Yeah I know what a boson is. STOP YOUR GIGGLING.

Note that this should not be confused with the "Oh-My-God Particle", which turned out to be a proton moving a relativistic speed and carrying around 50J of energy.