Tetherd Cow Ahead

October 15, 2008: ABC News Online:

Australia will join five other countries in what scientists describe as one of the most ambitious explorations of the Antarctic.

Buried deep beneath the Antarctic continent is a mountain range of such a huge scale that scientists are almost in awe of what they are about to do.

My God! DON’T THESE PEOPLE READ!?

Just for fun, blogging the NASA Phoenix Mars touchdown as it happens.

The NASA TV Stream is here. Phoenix has just successfully separated from its cruise stage and commenced its automatic landing sequence – that is, NASA is about to turn over the complicated descent process to the spacecraft’s onboard computers. Phoenix must complete dozens of tricky manoeuvres to get to the Mars surface in one piece – this is the part of the process that has seen disaster in many previous Mars missions.

The Odyssey Orbiter and the Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter are both relaying Phoenix mission data back to Earth, the mission having been planned to take advantage of the positions of each of these craft.

• Phoenix is just about to enter Mars atmosphere.

• Heat shield has been deployed.

• Phoenix altitude information is being successfully relayed… 1600 metres….

• Phoenix has touched down successfully!

• Jesus H. Christ, Windows Media Viewer is a shitty piece of crap – NASA! Have you people never used Quicktime? Please let Apple handle the media broadcast next time!

• There is some short delay while Phoenix prepares to begin its own independent transmissions back to Earth. The mood in Mission Control is jubilant though, so all has gone exactly to plan. I wish I could have seen them at the moment of touchdown, but the piece of rubbish that is WMV dropped all the image out and I had to reboot Firefox to get it back.

• Waiting for Phoenix telemetry to come online. Phoenix is tilted at a mere quarter of one degree from the vertical, and the next part of the process involves the unfolding of the solar array which of course is Phoenix’s power plant.

• Phoenix is functional and sending back images.

For the first time in 32 years, and only the third time in history, a JPL team has carried out a soft landing on Mars. I couldn’t be happier to be here to witness this incredible achievement. ~ NASA Administrator Michael Griffin

Some points of interest:

• After the touchdown, the Phoenix team waited for over 15 minutes before deploying the solar panels, one of their concerns being that dust kicked up by the engines might cover the solar cells and reduce their effectiveness. In the event, there was no discernible trace of dust at all.

• Phoenix is at Mars’ North Pole and is looking for proof of extant water (most likely in the form of ice) on the planet. The Phoenix team agrees that a white object that has been seen in one of the first surface images is probably not a polar bear.

The First Phoenix Press Conference

Mission Earth Day 2:

The Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter snapped this astonishing image of the Phoenix descending to the surface of Mars on its guidance ‘chute:

In another first for The Cow, this post comes to you live from the inter-city train that runs between Sydney and Melbourne. Well, not live, as such – there is no actual internet connection on the train, lest you think that Australia might be anywhere near that technologically hip – but I am typing it on my laptop ((You may think I’m that technologically hip.)) as we hurtle ((I use the word with irony.)) out of Albury Wodonga towards Melbourne, now about three hours away.

Being something of a fan of rail travel, and heading off to visit Violet Towne for a few days, I thought that instead of taking the usual ho-hum plane flight I might splurge the extra $20 ((That should really have clued me in… a 20 buck difference between Economy and First Class travel… )) and kick back in the luxury of First Class. Sure, the train takes about 6 times longer, but hey, First Class! You know: Leather seats; red velvet curtains; witty attractive passengers; crisp white linen table cloths and sparkling silver cutlery in the dining car. Orient Expressville baby! Get the picture?

Yep, it’s the wrong picture.

We head out of Sydney Central at 8am, late, but what’s rail travel without delays, right? The First Class carriage is moderately filled, but I have two seats to myself, and there is no-one behind me or across the aisle. Cool. Nice, quiet trip!

10 minutes out: Ergghh. These First Class seats are SO uncomfortable. They must be the only seats I’ve encountered anywhere in the world where reclining them increases their discomfort by a factor proportional to the angle of inclination (that’s not to say that they were comfortable upright either – I’ve sat on more luxurious seats in bus shelters). I marvel that anyone can have, even intentionally, designed something so back-achingly awful. I hope the designer, when he goes to Hell (for he surely will), spends Eternity in one of these seats.

20 minutes out: We stop at Strathfield Station, the last urban stop before we hit the country, and pick up a million extra passengers. Well I do exaggerate. But in a fitting demonstration of CountryLink ineptness, there are, in fact, more passengers boarding the train than there are seats available. Yippee. This causes more delays.

The seats around me fill up. With old ladies. Now I’ve got nothing at all against old ladies, but these are stupid old ladies. Stupid, loud, annoying old ladies. You know the kind of thing – everytime the train goes past a station one of them says “Oooh. Flemington. Oooh. Picton. Ooooh. Moss Vale”. One of them talks endlessly about absolutely nothing. In a very loud voice. For hours. I can’t even drown her out with my iPod turned up loud. I glare at her pointedly and screw my ear-buds in even tighter. She takes this as an invitation to turn her volume up from squawk to shrill. If I ever get that bad, someone shoot me.

The loudspeaker spruiks wares from the Buffet Car. Idiotically, I venture out for a cup of coffee (mostly so I can have some brief respite from the inane prattle which has now turned into a mix of racism and cooking suggestions). I come back with a scalding hot cup of weak instant sludge and a little container of UHT milk. I look at the these things on my cheap cardboard tray. Someone’s meddling with my sanity. First Class? Swill?

I try to console myself with the thought that if this is First Class, things must be truly hideous in Economy. Evidence of this is forthcoming pretty quickly. The First Class carriage is the second car on the train. The first car is a sleeper that has been converted to Economy seating for the daytime trip. This means the First Class carriage is between them and the Buffet Car.

Soon begins the long procession of Economy Class passengers intending to fuel themselves for the gruelling journey. The first thing I notice is most of these people hardly need fueling. In fact, dispensing with the train and jogging to Melbourne might be a good option for many of them.

There is one guy who has the most ENORMOUS belly I have ever seen. He’s not really a big man in other respects, but his belly looks like it composes the better part of his body mass. The most off-putting thing is that he chooses to highlight his asset by wearing tight jeans and an even tighter lycra t-shirt that allows the bottom of his stomach to sag out. The shirt’s slogan says ‘Buff Riders’. At first I thought it read ‘Butt Riders’ but I had ample opportunity to check. I don’t know which is worse when I think about it. He has no front teeth, and makes numerous trips back and forth to top up with Coke so he can remain that way.

Then there is the young, even groovy looking, guy in dark suit and sunglasses, who walks past clutching to his chest something that looks awfully like a carpet bag. Attentive to his threads he may be, attentive to his personal hygiene he definitely is not. A wave of overpowering body odour floods in his wake as he passes through. After his second trip, and the sense of disbelief that anyone could smell that bad has diminished, First Class passengers start to cringe pre-emptively when he enters the door at the far end of the carriage. For inexplicable reasons he makes numerous trips back and forth, always clutching the carpet bag, but never bringing back any food or drink.

From time to time the happy CountryLink staff keep us informed of where we are. Which wouldn’t be so bad except for the fact that every time they announce “Our next stop will be Goulburn”, the old ladies go into a flurry of repetition: “Ooooh, Goulburn! Next stop is Goulburn! Oooh…!” (I kid you not). I start dreading the click of the intercom that heralds the announcements.

So. Three hours or so to go and it’s getting dark.

I begin to really really wish this was the Orient Express. Not because I’m pining any longer for the crisp white tablecloths or the mahogany trim or the caviar and champagne, but because this First Class carriage is looking more and more like a very fitting setting for murder.

So anyway, I’m at Sydney Airport at Gate 32 when the following is heard across the PA system:

This is a final boarding call for passengers Arthur Gibson, Muriel Campanella, Ron Silvers and Bruce Majollica* on flight number D567 to Melbourne. This flight has boarded and is waiting on you in order to depart. Passengers Arthur Gibson, Muriel Campanella, Ron Silvers and Bruce Majollica, please make your way to Gate 34, your aircraft is ready to depart.

This announcement is made at least a half dozen times over the course of twenty minutes or so, with the staff becoming more and more agitated, but still maintaining the proper good-mannered airport aplomb. There are, in fact, four ‘Final’ boarding calls.

“You know what?” I say to Violet Towne. “If this was Cow Air, by now I’d be broadcasting it like this”:

Passengers Arthur Gibson, Muriel Campanella, Ron Silvers and Bruce Majollica, will you please get your slack asses out of the bar and over to Gate 34 quick smart. There’s a plane full of really pissed-off people here who want to know why you’re making the hour-long flight to Melbourne take twice as long. You’d better have good excuses.

Other innovations I would introduce on Cow Air:

•Disposal of useless safety demonstration on plane, replacing it with one word: PANIC! Because I know that’s what everyone would do if the plane started crashing. Why not make it easy for passengers to comply with instructions?

•Compulsory confinement to seats, upon landing of the aircraft, until after the exit doors have actually been opened. Can someone explain to me why as soon as the seatbelt sign is switched off everyone seems to feel the need to leap from their seat, desperately hoik their luggage out of the overhead compartment and then queue sardine-like in the plane aisle for ten minutes? Listen up people – the doors ain’t opening any faster just because you’re on your feet. The airline wants you off the plane just as much as you want to be off. Everybody is working for the same result here. You may as well enjoy the wait sitting down.†

•Free alcohol. No-one should have to endure Economy Class air travel sober.

•Summary execution for seat-kickers. Especially children.

•Coffee that tastes like coffee instead of watery aviation fuel.

•Cowhide covered seats. Wouldn’t that look cool!?

•Flame-grilled ribs. C’mon – even you vegetarians have gotta admit that the smell of fine BBQ wafting down the aisle at meal times would be w-a-a-a-y better than the sick-making odour of re-heated fish in foil.‡

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*Not their real names.

†I dunno – maybe it’s so they can get off the plane a few seconds earlier and relish the extra time at the baggage carousel?

‡Yes, alright, I can hear the more astute among you protesting that you’d never be able to eat ribs with plastic knives and forks. On Cow Air we don’t hold with such namby-pamby business as kiddy cutlery. Not only would passengers be allowed nail scissors and hacksaw blades, each would be issued with a steak knife. We believe that the real reason behind terrorism is bad airline food.

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Shiver me timbers me lads! And serve me up another cup o’ grog!

I’m back from the High Seas, faithful Acowlytes, and what a mighty adventure it was. The sights I saw! The fearsome sea serpents I battled!

Violet Towne and I have been on a trip to the Whitsunday Islands in Northern Queensland, one of the most beautiful places on earth. Under any circumstances this would have been a wonderful thing to have done, but it was even more of a treat owing to the fact that I won the holiday in last year’s Australian Maritime Museum Christmas Raffle.

Specifically, the prize was three days sailing on the Tall Ship the Derwent Hunter, a striking two-masted vessel made in the 1940s from the finest Australian ship-building timbers available. I don’t want to make you too jealous, but basically, we spent three days on the deck of a beautiful wooden ship, sailing under clear blue skies by day and star-filled skies by night. We swam off beaches of powdery white silica sand and dived among fishes so colourful that they put the rainbow to shame.

Lest you think this all sounds a little too much like Paradise, let me return to the bit about the fearsome sea serpents. Consider the sign that we encountered on our arrival:

I just want to point out that this BIG sign encompasses only jellyfish. It says nothing of sharks, stingrays, giant octopods or other ship-eating fishy things. But trust me, the jellyfish alone are enough to keep you in the cocktail bar.

Especially this one:

You may have missed a salient point here, so I will reiterate it – Size: 12mm. Twelve millimeters. About half an inch. Also – ‘transparent jellyfish – usually never seen’.

Up until 1964 the main evidence that someone had come into contact with an Irukandji was their dead body washed up on the beach… But I exaggerate for effect; in actual fact, death from the Irukandji is rare even if the symptoms are dire: back pain, nausea, abdominal cramps, sweating, hypertension, tachycardia and a feeling of impending doom.

A feeling of impending doom. Oh boy, as symptoms go that really sounds like a barrel of laughs.

The Irukandji is dangerous and unpleasant, but only one of a dozen scary toxic creatures that inhabit these waters. It is one of Nature’s cruel ironies that the beautiful blue seas off the coast of Queensland are filled with some of the most dangerous creatures on the planet. When the mercury rises, it seems that being denied the respite of the cool azure sea is an almost certain proof of the non-existence of a benign God.

Only a total bastard would pull a trick like that.

Of course, such trivial measures would never stop a pirate.