PSI TECH Correctly Identifies Source of the "Mars Probe Signal."

PSI TECH Spot Report: The Latest "Mars Probe Signal"

On 1/27/00, PSI TECH stated:

The origin of the signal, when you remote view that, it appears to be a long tubular structure, in what appears to be, something in orbit around the Earth. And it's either a signal being reflected off an orbiting derelict, or it's one of those NSA spy satellites or something like that. But it's not the Mars probe. It's something in orbit around the Earth, in periodic orbit, an echo or something similar.

NASA says faint signals most likely not from Polar Lander

February 16, 2000
Web posted at: 11:48 p.m. EST (0448 GMT)

PASADENA, California (CNN) -- Scientists waiting for a call from the lost Mars Polar Lander may have heard a wrong number. Radio signals that offered hope the Polar Lander was phoning home most likely did not come from the spacecraft, NASA said Wednesday.

The $165 million Polar Lander has not been heard from since December 3, the day it was supposed to land on the red planet. Last month, NASA managers said faint radio signals captured by a huge dish antenna at Stanford University in California could be coming from the Polar Lander.

But NASA issued a statement on Wednesday, saying detailed analysis shows the "suspect signal is more likely of terrestrial origin and not from Mars Polar Lander."

NASA also said analysis of other signals captured by radio telescopes in the Netherlands, Italy and at Stanford "has not yielded any signal from Mars Polar Lander."

"We saw something ... that had all the earmarks of a signal and we felt we had to check it out," project manager Richard Cook said. "Based on the latest results, it is unlikely that we will attempt to listen again."

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Wednesday February 16 7:52 PM ET

Scientists Backtrack on Mars Lander

By MATTHEW FORDAHL AP Science Writer

PASADENA, Calif. (AP) - A mysterious radio signal that reignited the search for NASA's Mars Polar Lander most likely did not originate from the Red Planet after all, engineers said Wednesday after reviewing the transmission.

Radio observatories around the world pointed their dish antennas toward Mars several times over the last month to hear the signal that could have come from the $165 million probe. The lander vanished Dec. 3, just as it was beginning its descent.

``We saw something ... that had all the earmarks of a signal, and we felt we had to check it out,'' said Richard Cook, the lander's project manager at NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory. ``Based on the latest results, it is unlikely that we will attempt to listen again.'' The new analysis suggests the original mystery signal probably came from satellites circling Earth or another source close to home, said Ivan Linscott, an electrical engineering researcher at Stanford University.

Stanford's 150-foot antenna picked up the original signal Jan. 4, but researchers did not know about it until recorded data was analyzed in mid-January. By then, NASA controllers had given up searching for the spacecraft.

Commands were quickly beamed to Mars in an effort to make the lander - if it was the source of the signal - transmit again at the same frequency, but the Stanford antenna detected nothing. Other failed attempts in recent weeks involved antennas in England, the Netherlands and Italy.