Hello All!   
      
   NASA Lands Car-Size Rover Beside Martian Mountain   
      
   August 6, 2012: NASA's most advanced Mars rover Curiosity has landed on the   
   Red Planet. The one-ton rover, hanging by ropes from a rocket backpack,   
   touched down onto Mars Sunday to end a 36-week flight and begin a two-year   
   investigation.   
      
   The Mars Science Laboratory (MSL) spacecraft that carried Curiosity succeeded   
   in every step of the most complex landing ever attempted on Mars, including   
   the final severing of the bridle cords and flyaway maneuver of the rocket   
   backpack.   
      
   Curiosity landed at 10:32 p.m. Aug. 5, PDT, (1:32 a.m. EDT Aug. 6) near the   
   foot of a mountain three miles tall and 96 miles in diameter inside Gale   
   Crater. During a nearly two-year prime mission, the rover will investigate   
   whether the region ever offered conditions favorable for microbial life.   
   Mars Landing (splash)   
      
   http://www.nasa.gov/mission_pages/msl/multimedia/gallery-indexEvents.html   
      
   One of Curiosity's first images (inset) shows the rover's shadow. The picture   
   was taken through a wide-angle lens on rover's rear Hazard-Avoidance camera.   
   It's only one-quarter of full resolution. As planned, the rover's early   
   engineering images are lower resolution. Larger color images are expected   
   later in the week when the rover's mast, carrying high-resolution cameras, is   
   deployed. More images   
      
   "The Seven Minutes of Terror has turned into the Seven Minutes of Triumph,"   
   said NASA Associate Administrator for Science John Grunsfeld. "My immense joy   
   in the success of this mission is matched only by overwhelming pride I feel   
   for the women and men of the mission's team."   
      
   Curiosity returned its first view of Mars, a wide-angle scene of rocky ground   
   near the front of the rover. More images are anticipated in the next several   
   days as the mission blends observations of the landing site with activities to   
   configure the rover for work and check the performance of its instruments and   
   mechanisms.   
      
   "Today, the wheels of Curiosity have begun to blaze the trail for human   
   footprints on Mars," declared NASA Administrator Charles Bolden. "Curiosity,   
   the most sophisticated rover ever built, is now on the surface of the Red   
   Planet, where it will seek to answer age-old questions about whether life ever   
   existed on Mars -- or if the planet can sustain life in the future,"   
      
   Confirmation of Curiosity's successful landing came in communications relayed   
   by NASA's Mars Odyssey orbiter and received by the Canberra, Australia,   
   antenna station of NASA's Deep Space Network.   
      
   Curiosity carries 10 science instruments with a total mass 15 times as large   
   as the science payloads on the Mars rovers Spirit and Opportunity. Some of the   
   tools are the first of their kind on Mars, such as a laser-firing instrument   
   for checking elemental composition of rocks from a distance. The rover will   
   use a drill and scoop at the end of its robotic arm to gather soil and   
   powdered samples of rock interiors, then sieve and parcel out these samples   
   into analytical laboratory instruments inside the rover.   
      
   To handle this science toolkit, Curiosity is twice as long and five times as   
   heavy as Spirit or Opportunity. The Gale Crater landing site places the rover   
   within driving distance of layers of the crater's interior mountain.   
   Observations from orbit have identified clay and sulfate minerals in the lower   
   layers, indicating a wet history.   
      
   "This is an amazing achievement, made possible by a team of scientists and   
   engineers from around the world and led by the extraordinary men and women of   
   NASA and our Jet Propulsion Laboratory," added Bolden. " President Obama has   
   laid out a bold vision for sending humans to Mars in the mid-2030's, and   
   today's landing marks a significant step toward achieving this goal."   
      
      
   Production editor: Dr. Tony Phillips | Credit: Science@NASA   
   More Information   
      
   This mission is managed by JPL for NASA's Science Mission Directorate in   
   Washington. The rover was designed, developed and assembled at JPL. JPL is a   
   division of the California Institute of Technology in Pasadena.   
      
   For more information on the mission, visit: http://www.nasa.gov/mars and   
   http://marsprogram.jpl.nasa.gov/msl .   
      
   Follow the mission on Facebook and Twitter at: http://www.facebo   
   k.com/marscuriosity And http://www.twitter.com/marscuriosity    
       
   Regards,   
      
   Roger    
   --- timEd/386 1.10.y2k+   
    * Origin: NCS BBS - Houma, LA - (1:3828/7)