Legacy Reports
The Columbia Hills in Color
Pasadena (JPL) May 31, 2004 - NASA's Mars Exploration Rover Spirit used its panoramic camera to take the images that make up this full-resolution mosaic of the Columbia Hills.
Legacy Reports
Opportunity On The Edge Of More Mars Science
Pasadena (JPL) May 30, 2004 - NASA's solar-powered Mars Exploration Rover Opportunity is beginning on Thursday what controllers expect to be frequent use of an overnight deep sleep mode to stretch the robot's power supply.
Legacy Reports
Sleep Well Dear Rovers
Pasadena (JPL) May 27, 2004 - NASA's solar-powered Mars Exploration Rover Opportunity is beginning on Thursday what controllers expect to be frequent use of an overnight deep sleep mode to stretch the robot's power supply.
Legacy Reports
Mars: All Dressed Up
Edmonton (SPX) May 26, 2004 - As if getting to Mars wasn't hard enough, astronauts also have to worry about what to wear when they arrive. Their concerns are not fashion pundits but exposure to micrometeor sandstorms, radiation, and a hyper-cold climate.
Legacy Reports
ESA Release: Lessons From Beagle 2 And Inquiry Recommendations
Paris (ESA) May 25, 2004 - The Mars Express spacecraft, carrying the Beagle 2 lander, was launched on 2 June last year, arriving in the vicinity of Mars in December. The separation of Beagle 2 from Mars Express occurred on 19 December. The satellite continued its mission with its successful insertion into a Mars orbit on 25 December, the day on which Beagle 2 was due to land.
Legacy Reports
UK Govt and ESA Keep Beagle 2 Failure Report Secret
Paris (ESA) May 25, 2004 - The Mars Express spacecraft, carrying the Beagle 2 lander, was launched on 2 June last year, arriving in the vicinity of Mars in December. The separation of Beagle 2 from Mars Express occurred on 19 December. The satellite continued its mission with its successful insertion into a Mars orbit on 25 December, the day on which Beagle 2 was due to land. London (UPI) May 24, 2004 The public may never be told why Britain's first Martian probe - Beagle 2 - disappeared last Christmas as it was about to land on Mars.
Legacy Reports
Odyssey’s Cannot Fail Attitude
Pasadena CA - May 25, 2004 - Like a sweet, older sibling standing quietly to the side as the baby of the family gets all the ooh's and aah's, the 2001 Mars Odyssey orbiter has blended into the background noise of cheers for the Mars Exploration Rover discoveries.
Legacy Reports
Mars Rover Inspects Stone Ejected From Crater
Pasadena CA (SPX) May 24, 2004 - NASA's Mars Exploration Rover Opportunity has begun sampling rocks blasted out from a stadium-sized impact crater the rover is circling, and the very first one may extend our understanding about the region's wet past.
Legacy Reports
Red Rover Robotics
Moffett Field (SPX) May 24, 2004 - Dr. William L. Red Whittaker is a principal scientist with the Robotics Institute at Carnegie Mellon University. He is also director of the Field Robotics Center, which he founded in 1986. Projects under his direction include unmanned robots to explore planetary surfaces and volcano interiors, and autonomous land vehicle navigation. Some of this work is funded by NASA's ASTEP (Astrobiology Science and Technology for Exploration of Planets) and the Mars Technology Program.
Legacy Reports
Round-Trip Survivor
Moffett Field (SPX) May 24, 2004 - To the Presidential Commission on Moon, Mars and Beyond, Dr. Marianne Frey, Professor Emeritus School of Aerospace Medicine, Wright State University, presented her views about the challenges to long-duration human exploration of the moon and Mars
Legacy Reports
Beagle 2 Mars Lander Doomed From The Start
London (AFP) May 23, 2004 - Severe organisational failures lie behind the loss of Beagle 2, the UK-lead space probe to Mars which vanished shortly before it landed on the Red Planet late last year, an official inquiry reported Monday.
Legacy Reports
Mars Rover Inspects Stone Ejected From Crater
Pasadena (JPL) May 18, 2004 - NASA's Mars Exploration Rover Opportunity has begun sampling rocks blasted out from a stadium-sized impact crater the rover is circling, and the very first one may extend our understanding about the region's wet past.
Legacy Reports
Lion’s Share Of Mars
Moffett Field - May 17, 2004 - Skating delicately around the rim of Endurance Crater, the Mars' Opportunity rover has traversed approximately 13 meters (about 43 feet) farther south along the eastern rim. On sol 104, the rover approached Lion Stone, a rock at the crater's edge that stands about 10 centimeters tall (about 4 inches) and is about 30 centimeters long (12 inches). This brought Opportunity's total mission odometry to greater than half a mile, or 1,054 meters (3,458 feet)!
Legacy Reports
Bringing Mars Back Home
Washington - May 13, 2004 - I am a strong advocate for robotic exploration of Mars. I am also an advocate for the human exploration of Mars, but in the future, after this robotic exploration has fulfilled certain requirements. Let me just talk a little about human exploration and why I think it is inevitable that we will ultimately go to Mars.
Legacy Reports
Deep Sleep Gives Opportunity Energy To Cruise Crater Endurance
Pasadena - May 12, 2004 - Opportunity awoke on sol 102 from its first deep sleep. This set of activities was initiated to conserve the energy that is being used by the instrument arm's stuck-on heater switch.
Legacy Reports
Mars Express Reports In As Final Deployment Delayed
Paris (ESA) May 12, 2004 - The overall operational performance of all spacecraft subsystems is good. Following difficulties encountered with the Solid State Mass Memory (SSMM) in the March-April timeframe, the upload of a new Solid State Mass Memory software version took place successfully in mid-April. No science operations were possible during the few days dedicated to this operation.