I know, Neil. I was merely joking about the conspiracy theories. I spent my teen years on a Florida beach 10 miles away from the Cape so I became pretty familiar with the vagarities of probes and rocket launches (ever seen one self-destruct? It's cool).

Although I have to admit, an instantaneous acceleration to c would be very cool <g>.





>The only reason the data hasn't been released is because a full set of instrument calibration and anomoly testing has to be done prior to the release of the corrected data.
>
>There have been numerous data spikes which if not corrected would give the wrong conclusions. i.e. the probe recorded instantaneous acceleration to the speed of light at one stage, it was apparently caused by radiation affecting one of the instruments.
>
>Also when the probe drops out of drag free flight because of a problem with one of the gyros, all data during this outage period would be lost, whereas conducting a controlled outage whilst in test mode the data should be able to be recovered.
>
>
>>I have heard some "conspiracy theories" on the lack of data :-)
>>
>>>>Hi Leland,
>>>>
>>>>
>>>>Isn't this the probe that was delayed by literally decades that's supposed to provide proofs on relavistic theories? Do you have a personal stake in this probe?
>>>
>>>The probe is to determine relativistic effects, indeed. Specifically, "frame dragging", meaning (roughly) that space and time are distorted by rotating masses.
>>>
>>>I don't know about delays - it is possible. I just heard about the mission when it was launched.
>>>
>>>There have been discussions in the past, here at the UT, about the T.O.R., so Leland is posting the mission updates for anyone interested.
>>>
>>>The mission has not yet published data; they are postponing that until they gather all the data and finish analyzing it, or something.