# Talk:Mariner 1

I do not flatly deny the contents of the section in question. To be quite frank, it seems very thoughtfully and reasonably written by an at least moderately knowledgeable person. However -- if you read the section, you will see that it very much presents an interpretation of facts that are admittedly little known. It is very speculative without warning a less-knowledgeable reader that it is so. In essence, the whole section is written as an opinion on whatever caused the probe's destruction and its consequences -- and not as an exploration of said causes or as a revelation of the scarce evidence that there is. For example, I have read elsewhere that Arthur Clarke was the source for the quotation in the title. Maybe I am wrong, but the use of quotes indicates that someone spoke it first, and that source should be cited. I propose that someone intimate with the project's history does a toned-down rewrite of that section. SrAtoz (talk) 20:17, 13 November 2011 (UTC)

The Apollo program has a space mission box, where the follow-up and preceeding missions can be easily seen. Is there a reason why such a box is not used for this unmanned mission? Sae1962 (talk) 07:43, 28 August 2012 (UTC)

I check pages listed in Category:Pages with incorrect ref formatting to try to fix reference errors. One of the things I do is look for content for orphaned references in wikilinked articles. I have found content for some of Mariner 1's orphans, the problem is that I found more than one version. I can't determine which (if any) is correct for this article, so I am asking for a sentient editor to look it over and copy the correct ref content into this article.

Reference named "LL":
From Mariner 2: McDowell, Jonathan. "Launch Log". Jonathan's Space Page. Retrieved 12 September 2013.
From Mars 2MV-4 No.1: McDowell, Jonathan. "Launch Log". Jonathan's Space Page. Retrieved 29 July 2010.

I apologize if any of the above are effectively identical; I am just a simple computer program, so I can't determine whether minor differences are significant or not. AnomieBOT⚡ 10:06, 25 September 2013 (UTC)

One NASA source says that the Mariner 1 Post Flight Review Board determined that the omission of a hyphen in coded computer instructions in the data-editing program allowed transmission of incorrect guidance signals to the spacecraft. During the periods the airborne beacon was inoperative the omission of the hyphen in the data-editing program caused the computer to incorrectly accept the sweep frequency of the ground receiver as it sought the vehicle beacon signal and combined this data with the tracking data sent to the remaining guidance computation. This caused the computer to swing automatically into a series of unnecessary course corrections with erroneous steering commands which finally threw the spacecraft off course.   This is a very different account from the others, and it omits lots of relevant details.  I wonder if the referenced Mariner 1 Post Flight Review Board report is available online, when it was produced, etc. so we can check it more completely.  I couldn't find it in a quick search.  ★NealMcB★ (talk) 05:35, 1 November 2014 (UTC)

This is an interpretation by a modern writer, no one would *ever* have referred to the logic branch in question a "data-editing software" and that would have been beyond conception at the time. The issue was in a failure condition where the data uplinked failed the sanity checks, and the alternate (and temporary) configuration had a bug in it. It was not a hyphen but no one would have understood "overbar" which represents a filtered value. There's nothing too mysterious about this, the entire section in question is more of a semantics exercise than it is an engineering evaluation.  — Preceding unsigned comment added by 192.91.173.34 (talk) 20:34, 9 May 2018 (UTC)

This review is transcluded from Talk:Mariner 1/GA2. The edit link for this section can be used to add comments to the review.
Reviewer: Mover of molehills (talk · contribs) 23:32, 3 July 2021 (UTC)
Will add soon!

Thanks very much! I hope you enjoy it. :) --Neopeius (talk) 00:33, 5 July 2021 (UTC)
@Mover of molehills: just a quick ping for this review. Balon Greyjoy (talk) 06:02, 4 August 2021 (UTC)

Will start below. @Neopeius: Just letting you know that I've started leaving comments.


### General feedback and nitpicks
Overall, this article is well-written and descriptive, but I think the biggest challenge will be expanding it and adding more details to relevant sections.
Thank you. :)
The lead feels fairly short. Maybe expand it into two short paragraphs, the first about the purpose of the mission and the instruments it was carrying and the second about its failure.
Fixed.
In the lead, I believe that the word "takeoff" should be "liftoff."
Fixed.
In the "background" section, could you elaborate on the Space Race a bit, and why Venus was an appealing target? (i.e. the events of the Space Race that had occurred to this point)?
expanded
And in the first sentence of this section, why is there the note "172" next to reference 1? If this is a page number, I think it should be listed in the references.
I am using RP format. As this is a source with multiple citations, this is the proper usage.
Got it, thanks for the clarification.
Even though you include a WikiLink to it, I don't think "bleeding edge" is a good term to use. Maybe just say something about the technology being so new as to be risky (and if you want, you can link that phrase to the bleeding edge article).
fixed
The line "and U.S. Air Force contractor..." I think is a typo, you should add an article.
It is a typo, but the other way around; it shouldn't have commas. Fixed. :)
I would say "first pioneer probes" instead of "first pioneers."
fixed
The parenthetical phrase in the second paragraph of the "background" section shouldn't be its own sentence, it should be combined with the previous one.
I am not certain I agree on this one. The last reviewer wanted it omitted, but I felt that left an open loop for the reader. But it's not directly relevant to the Mariner 1 narrative, so I feel parantheses is the most appropriate set-off.
I see – I take back my original suggestion. Still, now that I look at it, it seems like it actually might flow better out of the parentheses (even though it's not connected to Mariner 1, you're telling the stories of the two rockets that were used to test the spacecraft, so they should be given equal weight). Mover of molehills (talk) 21:08, 15 August 2021 (UTC)
I would go more into Venera 1 – even if it stopped transmitting, it still was the first probe to fly by Venus. I think you should add a little bit more about the impact that this spacecraft had on the development of Mariner 1, too, if you can find the sources for it.
Expanded, but I can't find that Venera 1 impacted Mariner's development. If you have a source, I'd love to see!
What you added looks pretty good. Mover of molehills (talk) 21:08, 15 August 2021 (UTC)
Could you mention how some of the rockets used here were being derived from those used to launch ballistic missiles? I think it could be interesting given the Cold War context.
I don't know how relevant it would be. We're only discussing a single booster (the Atlas) and two first stages, the Agena and the Centaur.
I don't know, it still might be interesting even if you just added "...which was originally created to launch the SM-65 Atlas ballistic missile." Mover of molehills (talk) 21:08, 15 August 2021 (UTC)
@Neopeius: just a ping to follow up on this section, it's kind of buried right now. Mover of molehills (talk) 20:07, 25 August 2021 (UTC)
I think the last parenthetical phrase would read better as "(so named because it was a Ranger derivative)", or something similar.
Fixed.
I would change the first sentence in the "Spacecraft" section to "two for launching and one to run tests, which was also to be used as a spare."
Fixed.
If it's easy to convert, it would be interesting to see the statistic about radiation 2x that of Earth orbit expressed in terms of the level of radiation found on Earth itself – might be more impressive.
It's just the inverse square law. :)
I see, okay. Mover of molehills (talk) 21:08, 15 August 2021 (UTC)
Why is the picture in the infobox a picture of Mariner 2? I feel like it would be better to include a picture of Mariner 1 (maybe the one where it's launching).
That's an artistic rendering that I think predates the launch of either probe. For example.
Got it. Mover of molehills (talk) 21:08, 15 August 2021 (UTC)
You say "the main body of the craft was a hexagonal" - do you mean hexagon?
I meant to omit the "a"
To make it more readable, the list of devices that the spacecraft carried in the "structure" section might read better as a bullet-pointed list.
Bullet pointed the cases. It's a little tricky since bits were spread among them.
Again, for readability: could you wikilink the phrase "high gain antenna"?
Fixed.
The sentence "An omnidirectional antenna atop Mariner R would broadcast at times that the spacecraft was rolling or tumbling out of its proper orientation, to maintain contact with Earth, though its signal was much weaker" really didn't make sense to me. Consider rewriting it (for one, do you mean that the antenna would broadcast at times when it was rolling, or that at times the spacecraft would roll and the antenna would broadcast?).
Expanded.
Out of curiosity, how are louvers considered active insulation? It seems like a structural feature.
Because they open and close depending on the temperature.
Just saw this, thank you! Will address this week. --Neopeius (talk) 09:30, 13 August 2021 (UTC)
Thank you for your tactful, constructive critique. Much appreciated. Fixes made (or discussed) and I'm ready when you are for the rest of your edits, as needed. :) --Neopeius (talk) 16:32, 15 August 2021 (UTC)
Thank you! Here are a few more, and then I will be done with this section: Mover of molehills (talk) 21:08, 15 August 2021 (UTC)
Small nitpick: you say the phrases "Mariner 1" and "Mariner R" a lot, when you could just say "the spacecraft" for it to read clearer. Consider changing this, especially in the lead and "Spacecraft" and "Launch failure" sections, when it is already unambiguous what spacecraft you are referring to.
I try to take into account that a reader made jump to a section without viewing any others, particularly on a cell phone. I've clarified things.
The last two sections of the lead should probably be combined, and the last one is missing a punctuation mark at the end.
I have no idea to what you are referring. The lead currently has two paragraphs, formatted per your earlier suggestions.
Suggested rephrase for the last line of paragraph 2 in section 1: "These opportunities mark the best time to launch exploratory spacecraft, since lower fuel needs make space for a greater range of experimental equipment."
Fixed.
For clarity, I would change "precluded" to "prevented" in the start of the "backround" subsection of the "scientific package" section.
Prevent suggests a positive action. Preclude simply means that somethings keeps something from happening.
Unless there's an ambiguity that I'm missing here, I would change "life as existed on Earth" to just "life."
Even in the 1950s, there were lots of conjectured extraterrestrial life processes. They may yet be undiscovered unearthly life on Venus. :)
Do you mean to say "Mariner 1" at the beginning of the second paragraph of this section?
I don't, but I've changed it to "the Mariner spacecraft" -- the thing is, they were identical, so singling out Mariner 1 makes it seem like its mission was unique. Also, once this language passes GA, I plan to recycle it for Mariner 2, which could use the historical context.
Same section: could you specify a little bit more what at least few of the "outstanding questions" were?
Fixed.
Just realize that you use "interplanetary space" several times, it should probably be WikiLinked the first time.
Fixed.
The "ultimately" in the first sentence of the "experiments" section isn't necessary unless you're going to talk about the design process.
Fair enough.
Instead of the ambiguous  "if they existed" in the third bullet point here, I would put "(which were later shown not to exist)".
Fixed.
I think the last part of the first sentence in the "flight plan and ground operations" section should just be "such that they arrived at Venus between the 8th and 16th of December.
Added "both" preceding to make it clear they were supposed to be close together timing-wise.
Nitpick: the beginning of the last sentence in this section is phrased passively, try changing it to "the Atlantic Missile Range would provide real-time radar tracking..."
Passives removed (fixed Palomar, too)
Overall, the scientific package section reads really well!
Yay!
When there is a wikilink to "the computer that guided Atlas-Agena," the target section doesn't contain much information about the computer. I would either get rid of the link or describe in greater depth in this article.
The problem is I don't think an in-depth description is appropriate here (especially in an article that has often been too technical). The target is reasonably useful and perhaps I'll upgrade it someday. :)
Try rephrasing the sentence at the end of the first paragraph of the "cause of the malfunction" section to "In the hand-written code, which was then coded onto punch cards..." instead of the way you have it now.
Fixed.
I don't think the sentence about Scott Manley is particularly relevant.
It's relevant but not well worded. Try it now.
Instead of saying "during this not-uncommon occurrence", I would say "Because this was a fairly common occurrence..."
Fixed.
Additionally, the italics in "veer further off course" should be removed.
I like empasizing out that the computer thought it was doing the right thing, causing exactly the wrong thing.
Finally, I think that the legacy section here could definitely use some expansion. I'm sure you know more about the subject than me and what could be interesting to include, but I would suggest talking more about public perceptions of the failure (i.e. looking at newspaper editorials from the time if you can find them – let me know if you want help with this). Additionally, I found one source (https://www.mentalfloss.com/article/502943/day-1962-nasa-launched-and-destroyed-mariner-1) which says that the 18.5 million loss translates to over $150 million when adjusted for inflation, so that could bear mentioning as well.
Added the dollar deflators. The thing is there wasn't much press at the time except for what was already discussed in the launch failure section. Perhaps renaming Legacy would help.
The picture currently captioned "Woomera" should be called "the communications station at Woomera" to be more specific.
":fixed

Great! That should be all for this section of the review. @Neopeius: just pinging you to let you know that I have finished this section and will organize the rest of the review by GA criteria (although probably a lot of the content in these categories has already been covered above):
In the "background" section, just say "around June 1959" instead of "in and around June 1959."
fixed
Another typo: in the first sentence of the fourth paragraph of the "background" section, it should say "the Jet Propulsion Laboratory."
I've been referring to JPL without the definite article throughout. I don't think "the" is warranted (any more than one would say the STL or the NASA)


### Well written
For now, this is mostly covered by the section above – I'll see if I have more commments later.


### Verifiable without OR
If it doesn't conflict with the format you are using, I would use dates in the form "October 4, 1957" rather than "4 October 1957." Since it seems like your sources tend to use the first format, it just makes for a better paraphrase.
I understand your point. I've been making all of my articles consistent with the other format; it makes more sense, and it obviates the need for extra commas. :)
The first sentence in the "background" section doesn't seem to be directly verified by the source, and is veering on OR. I don't want to be a stickler about this, but you could just use this source: https://www.history.com/topics/cold-war/space-race. Also, the sentence reads a little bit dramatically right now, so it could use rephrasing.
Fixed.
Again, you're veering on OR when you say "so that the size of the experimental package can be maximized," since this isn't supported by the source. I would either find a new source or just say "to save fuel."
Fixed.
As far as I can tell, the first two sentences in the third paragraph of the "background" section are unreferenced.
"As the Mariner spacecraft would spend most of its journey to Venus in interplanetary space, the mission also offered an opportunity for long-term measurement of the solar wind of charged particles and to map the variations in the Sun's magnetosphere. The concentration of cosmic dust beyond the vicinity of Earth could be explored as well.[3]:176"?
Never mind, sorry – I see it now. Mover of molehills (talk) 21:03, 25 August 2021 (UTC)
You say that the Pioneer 5 probe was tracked for 25,000,000 miles, but on page 48 of the document that you cited it only mentions tracking it for about 1.6 million. Where did you find this statistic?
Fixed.
Also, the sentence "the project proved too ambitious, and the launch window was missed" is not supported in this same document.
Fixed. Found the document that supports it. This is all stuff I rescued from the TRW museum, by the way. :)
Thanks again @Mover of molehills: -- I will get to this this week. :) --Neopeius (talk) 13:53, 24 August 2021 (UTC)
Fixed most. Dinner time. Will address rest shortly. --Neopeius (talk) 00:54, 25 August 2021 (UTC)
@Mover of molehills: All changes addressed, most implemented. Thank you for a truly thorough GA (that felt like an FA!) I'm sorry I left things in such a mess for you, and I'm glad you stuck with it, and didn't just abandon it as hopeless. --Neopeius (talk) 02:50, 25 August 2021 (UTC)
Great! I just have a couple more for this section, and then I'm guessing the last three will be pretty much automatic passes. Mover of molehills (talk) 21:01, 25 August 2021 (UTC)
At the beginning of the "background" subsection, I don't see evidence for the claim that they believed Venus was tidally locked, or that this claim has been disproven. Here's a source you could use: https://knowablemagazine.org/article/physical-world/2020/can-a-tidally-locked-planet-support-life
Claim for belief is on page 57 of the article (rotation equals revolution -- definition of tidally locked) but I see your point about later disproved. Thank you for finding a source. :)
Source 14 actually says that the craft was sent without a television camera – could you rephrase the accompanying sentence to make this more clear?
I just got rid of the line. I was trying to say "These are all the things considered" to open the TV loop in the mind of the reader, but honestly, it's not necessary. So I just moved the citation to the Sagan quote.
@Neopeius: I actually don't have access to sources 13, 15 and 18 at the moment. Do you mind wikimailing those to me? Then I could be done with the review. Mover of molehills (talk) 21:09, 25 August 2021 (UTC)
Here you go. @Mover of molehills: --Neopeius (talk) 14:09, 26 August 2021 (UTC)
I will try to get to it tomorrow. :) @Mover of molehills: --Neopeius (talk) 00:49, 26 August 2021 (UTC)
In the list of experiments, where does it mention that the fluxgate magnetometer was three-axis?
Click on the Experiments link. I generally just use the main NSSDC reference as the citation rather than linking the equivalent of tabs. --Neopeius (talk) 14:01, 28 August 2021 (UTC)
Anything left @Mover of molehills:? :) --Neopeius (talk) 18:45, 2 September 2021 (UTC)
Here's the last batch! Mover of molehills (talk) 22:46, 4 September 2021 (UTC)
The sentence "The aim of Mariner R project was to launch the two operational spacecraft within a 30 day period on slightly differing paths such that they both arrived at Venus between the 8th and 16th of December" could use a more thorough paraphrase from the original source.
Better?
Also try to paraphrase the sentence starting with "taking into account the motion of Earth and Venus..." In general, try to synthesize information into the article instead of just changing individual words within a sentence – you've been pretty good about that throughout the rest of the article.
Better?
I don't see the citation for the phrase "errors in trajectory would be corrected by a mid-course burn of Mariner's onboard engines" in the reference given.
Thanks -- added appropriate pages from source.
As far as I can tell, the "Launch failure" section is sourced from page 87 of the source, not pages 231-233.
Good catch.
Again, I think that this section as well could really use a better paraphrase. Several complete phrases like "several delays caused by trouble in the range safety command system. Concern over the cause of a blown fuse in the range safety circuits..." are taken almost directly from the source. I might just start these two paragraphs from scratch – same content, but less based on the source.
Better?
I don't see support for the phrase "which was then coded onto punch cards and into the guidance computer" in the cited article.
Artifact from the older source. Fixed.
I couldn't find Source 23 when I looked for it – it may have been taken off of the Chicago Tribune website.
Added url and also [620722trib.jpg here]
Great, I'm all done with this section! I might have a few comments for the last four sections, but I think they will all probably be quick passes. Great job, and let me know when you resolve all of these final suggestions! Mover of molehills (talk) 22:46, 4 September 2021 (UTC)


### Broad
Something to add to the legacy section: both the Time article and this source (https://timeandnavigation.si.edu/navigating-space/challenges/mariner-1-destroyed) talk about how the launch failure underscored the importance of checking for bugs in software.
Time article? Incorporated other article.
In the same section, could you also mention that although Mariner 1 did not succeed it was the first American interplanetary spacecraft ever launched?
Better?


### Neutral
Passed, since there is nothing that controversial in the topic. Mover of molehills (talk) 22:47, 4 September 2021 (UTC)


### Stable
Also passed. Mover of molehills (talk) 22:47, 4 September 2021 (UTC)


### Illustrated
While it doesn't have that many images, it seems like you've done a good job with what's available on the Internet. The last thing I would recommend is inserting a photo of Venus taken by one of the later Mariners if you can find one available. Mover of molehills (talk) 22:52, 4 September 2021 (UTC)
I don't think that's appropriate for this article. That won't happen until Mariner 11, a thoroughly unrelated mission.

@Neopeius: And that's all! I can put this article on hold if you want, but it seems unnecessary since you've been so quick at getting back to changes. Let me know when you're done! Mover of molehills (talk) 23:07, 4 September 2021 (UTC)

@Mover of molehills: please don't put it on hold. I'll get to it this week. :) --Neopeius (talk) 04:22, 5 September 2021 (UTC)
@Mover of molehills: All issues addressed. How are we looking? --Neopeius (talk) 03:40, 6 September 2021 (UTC)


### Verdict
Promoted. Thank you for bearing with me through this process – I think we've improved the article a lot since the beginning. If you ever nominator for FA (and I hope you do!) I would suggest trying to add a great range of sources and more secondary sources, but for now it passes the GA criteria very solidly. Mover of molehills (talk) 12:18, 6 September 2021 (UTC)

Thanks very much! I left a message on your Talk page regarding using some of this verbiage on the Mariner 2 page, since it's designed to be modular. What do you think? --Neopeius (talk) 13:38, 6 September 2021 (UTC)

This section is a bit of a mess.
For a start...
"The guidance program was supposed to contain a hyphen which instructed the computer to ignore data coming from the Atlas's rate beacon"
"Subsequent popular accounts of the accident often referred to the erroneous character as a "hyphen" (describing the missing component of the symbol) rather than an "R-bar""
If the latter is correct, then this section is perpetuating that very misconception. 82.2.111.160 (talk) 16:40, 19 July 2025 (UTC)