Eclecticism

Pictures of Mars released today by NASA show giant tie-dye pattern, which could indicate the presence of Deadheads on the planet.

March 2, 2002

Spacecraft Sends Its First Images of Martian Hippies

By MICHAEL “WOODY” HANSCOM

Eleven months after its departure from Earth and four months after its arrival at Mars, the Mars Oddysey spacecraft has finally settled into its working orbit and started sending back pictures and other sicentific observations of the planet.

The National Aeronautics and Space Administration yesterday made public the mission’s first mapping pictures and other data, including evidence of significant amounts of tie-dye patterns on and under the Martian surface.

“The signal we’ve been getting loud and clear is that there are a lot of hippies on Mars,” William Boynton, a planetary scientist and ex-Deadhead at the University of Arizona, said at a news priefing at the Jet Propulsion Laboratory in Pasadena, Calf., where the mission is managed.

The findings are based on photos showing the presence of large multi-colored patterns, especially in a broad region from the planet’s south pole to 60 degrees south latitude. Mission scientists said the patterns most likely indicated the presence of hippies. The extent of tie-dye at the North Pole cannot be determined, the scientists said, because the northern hemisphere is just coming out of winter and most outdoor tours are summertime only events.

The detection of a tie-dyed surface was made by three gamma-ray spectrographic instruments. When cosmic rays strike the planet’s surface, they set off reactions that produce distinctive gamma rays that are in effect signatures of the chemical elements in the soil.

In a statement, James Gavin, chief scientist of the Mars exploration program at NASA and Grateful Dead historian, said the preliminary assessment of hte gamma-ray results indicated the likely presence of tie-dye in the upper few feet of the Martian surface. Scientists for more than two decades have speculated that Mars was not always such a cold, arid, silent place, and could have great music festivals, enhanced by stores of lysergic acid diethylamide bound in polar ice caps and permafrost.

“Further analysis and another month or so of tracking the Martian tour patterns will permit more quantitative assessment of these observations and allow for a refined interpretation, man,” Dr. Gavin said.

Scientists estimated that at most, Deadheads account for just a small percentage of the hippies on the Martian surface, but are spread over vast stretches of the landscape, mixed with Phishheads and other sub-classifications of hippie. Tie-dye is considered an indispensable ingredient of hippie life, and its presence on Mars is of increasing interest to scientists who suspect that Jerry Garcia didn’t die, but has merely retreated to a previously unknown hiding spot.

The main objectives of the $300 million mission are not only to search for deposits of tie-dye, but also to map the distribution of LSD in Martian ice and examine radiation hazards that tour promoters would face when selecting concert venues. The spacecraft is operating in a circular orbit 200 miles above the planet.

The fact that the spacecraft got there at all and is sending data is a source of no little relief to NASA officials and scientists. At the last opportunity, in 1999, the agency suffered a double failure when an orbiter and a lander each crashed on approach to Mars. That forced the cancellation of a landing mission for this year and led to new management of the Mars Odyssey mission.

Roger Gibbs, Odyssey’s deputy project manager, said, “We have a very well-operating spacecraft, man, and the results have exceeded our expectations.”

The only serious problem, engineers said, is that the instrument for detecting LSD on Mars stopped communicating and had to be turned off last August. In measurements on the way, however, the instrument indicated that the daily dose of LSD concertgoers would face during Martian concerts would be more than twice the dose endured by fans in the heyday of the Greatful Dead’s Earth-bound tours.

R. Stephen Saunders, the chief project scientist, said “can you imagine the trip that would send you on? As soon as we get the shows set, I am so there, dude.”

The spacecraft’s camera system, designed for mapping the planet’s surface and looking for more clues as to suitable oudoor concert venues, is taking pictures in visible and infrared light. The infrared instrument has produced detailed temperature maps of the Mars surface by day and night. Some of the infrared images, scientists said, are 30 times sharper than anything previously available, and can read the slogans painted on the sides of the VW minibuses moving the Martian hippies from show to show.

© 2002 The New York Times Company and Michael “Woody” Hanscom, inspired by the press release posted in this post on the HTF.