Japan's Venus Climate Orbiter In Venus Orbit!

a reply to: eriktheawful

The mysteries of Venus have gone largely unknown due to the efforts or lack of by the US and the former USSR. If one looks for a pattern to the early explorations of Mars and Venus, it seems clear that the soviets chose Venus to investigate because it seemed in those early days of space exploration as the best possible home of the UFO phenomena. On the other hand, the US seems to have chosen to concentrate on Mars.

The soviets had decent success with several of their probes considering the harsh nature of Venus that they discovered on dropping down onto the surface. The most glaring fact, learned quickly, was that Venus was a very unhospitable place and very unlikely to harbor intelligent life. This basic determination can explain why the US mostly ignored exploring Venus and looked to Mars for answer to puzzling questions about ET life.

The US efforts to Mars, however, displayed the exact reverse. The more we learned about Mars with Mariner, Viking and subsequent probes, the better the indications that there was or had been life forms there. That positive outlook continues to this very day if, indeed, not confirmed with probes as early as the Vikings in the late 1970s.

The Russians, alas, have NEVER had--out of over thirty probes launched toward Mars--had a successful mission, a couple of near misses is all. It has been suggested that there is a high strangeness as to why all Russian attempts have been met with failures and the US has had multiple successes.

originally posted by: buster2010

Same here. They have more than enough cameras on board to get some decent pics.
Akatsuki
The scientific payload consists of six instruments: the Lightning and Airglow Camera (LAC), an ultraviolet imager (UVI), a longwave infrared camera (LIR), a 1 μm camera (IR1), a 2 μm camera (IR2), and the radio science (RS) experiment. The five imaging cameras will explore Venus in wavelengths from ultraviolet to the mid-infrared.[9]

The LAC will look for lightning in the visible wavelengths of 552 to 777 nanometers. The LIR will study the structure of high-altitude clouds at a wavelength where they emit heat (10 μm). The UVI will study the distribution of specific atmospheric gases such as sulfur dioxide in ultraviolet wavelengths (293–365 nm). The IR1 will peer through semi-transparent windows in Venus' atmosphere to see heat radiation emitted from Venus' surface rocks (0.90–1.01 μm) and will help researchers to spot active volcanoes, if they exist. The IR2 will detect heat radiation emitted from the lower reaches of the atmosphere.

Yes. Visible light cameras will be of little use if they want to look at surface features due to Venus being shrouded in thick clouds. However, the visible light camera and the short wavelength IR camera could be useful in studying those clouds. To peer at the surface features through the clouds, other wavelengths of the EM spectrum are necessary, such as the long IR camera you mentioned.

NASA's Magellan spacecraft used radar to cut through the clouds of Venus to image its surface. Using the radar information, they were able to build up 3D models of the surface.

originally posted by: Aliensun
It has been suggested that there is a high strangeness as to why all Russian attempts have been met with failures and the US has had multiple successes.

WE here at this conspiracy site know exactly why!
WINK WINK WINKITY WINK WINK

originally posted by: scubagravy
a reply to: LightSpeedDriver

to understand how women really work ?

So it gonna be back in without data

a reply to: rajas

"down to earth"

Thank you! I consider myself fairly down to earth and I want to stay there. But any science or information about space, is equally down to Earth, don't you think? It's fascinating, and I enjoy reading about it (although admittedly I don't understand it all).

originally posted by: rajas
This breaks my heart...

Why would this break your heart?

It's amazing really, as they were not able to insert the craft into orbit the first time back in 2010, but now after 5 years they succeeded.

I think it's a good testament to "Never give up."

originally posted by: buster2010
Because Venus is the perfect example of the runaway greenhouse gas effect.

Venus Greenhouse Effect
When did this become fact? I was under the impression that this was a theory and an open debate still continued as to whether a greenhouse gas effect could produce such high temperatures. Even if it could, with a myriad of variables on a global scale, how could it be proven that this is indeed what happened on Venus?

I had supposed that this was a good reason to send an atmospheric probe to check it out. Is the heat and pressure a product of a runaway greenhouse effect or is the greenhouse gasses and pressure a product of the heat from an unknown cause? Venus is full of enigmas.

originally posted by: Aliensun
The mysteries of Venus have gone largely unknown due to the efforts or lack of by the US and the former USSR.

There is also still a lot of interest in using Mars as a possible jumping off point for colonization and eventual migration into the stars. Unfortunately, living on Venus is pretty much a non-starter since its atmosphere is so punishing.

Of course, we might be able to create some kind of CO2 eating, Nitrogen/Oxygen/water pooping bacteria or something that could eat enough of the Venusian atmosphere to bring the temperature down to make it tolerable for humans, but that would certainly take a long, long time. And we would also have to figure out a way to speed up the rotational speed of the planet so it wouldn't just be constant destructive storms.

It would take a lot of time and engineering, but since we pretty much all agree that Venus is a kind of write-off, we can start small with a few probes that can drop bacteria from blimps or something, and start working on those ion-drive probes that can zing some asteroids past Venus close enough to maybe get it spinning a little faster.

a reply to: Devino

Venus Greenhouse Effect
When did this become fact?

The Venus greenhouse effect shows you what happens when this the process of trapping sunlight goes out of control into a runaway

With such a high albedo and the dense atmosphere then how much sunlight can be reaching the surface? Next to none I'd say.
So where does the heat come from? They don't think there are active volcanoes any more, so unless the surface itself is very hot, being heated from below, how else could the atmosphere just above the surface be so hot?

originally posted by: GaryN
So where does the heat come from?

Venus has many enigmas. Retrograde rotation, no magnetic field yet a very thick atmosphere and an apparent Global Resurfacing Event thought to be relatively recent in Venus’ history. This seems to imply a recent global catastrophe which could have caused such extreme temperatures detected. Perhaps Venus has yet to cool off from such an event.