Slashdot Mirror

← Back to Stories (view on slashdot.org)

Mars Rovers On Final Approach

Posted by timothy on from the watch-for-m&m-helices dept.

leapis writes "In the wake of the possible loss of the Beagle 2 Mars probe, let us not forget that the Mars Rovers are scheduled for arrival in orbit this weekend. As noted in this article at Space.com, the fourth and final course correction has been made, and Spirit, the first of two spacecraft, will touch down around 22:34 on 3 Jan 2004. More information and a countdown to the landing can be found here."

3 of 204 comments (clear)

  1. Question by Sklivvz · · Score: 5, Interesting

    The article says the rover's trajectory has been updated. Is it because they were afraid it would land in a crater like beagle2?

    I do hope at least one probe lands right. It is one of the advantages of having NASA, ESA and other space agencies competing, when did it happen before this that we had so many probes heading on the same planet?

    Does anyone know the different purposes they have?

    --
    My Stack Overflow user
    1. Re:Question by SegFault · · Score: 5, Interesting

      In 1971 five different Mars-bound spacecraft were launched by the US and the USSR. Of the five, only Mariner 9 returned much useful data, to the tune of 7,329 pictures. The USSR "Mars 3" returned a few pictures and some data before it died. The other three craft failed.

  2. Re:A couple of comments by SegFault · · Score: 5, Interesting

    Mars Scorecard:

    USA: 8/14 (so far, not counting MER-A and MER-B)

    USSR/Russia: 4/16 (two of the four returned very little data)

    Japan: 0/1

    Europe .5/1 (so far, maybe the Beagle will bark)

    Source: http://mars.jpl.nasa.gov/missions/log/