6 kb/s to 70 m Deep Space Network, 250 b/s to surface command[2]
Official insignia of the Mars Pathfinder mission.
Discovery program
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Mars Pathfinder[1] is an American robotic spacecraft that landed a base station with a roving probe on Mars in 1997. It consisted of a lander, renamed the Carl Sagan Memorial Station, and a lightweight, 10.6 kg (23 lb) wheeled robotic Mars rover named Sojourner,[4] the first rover to operate outside the Earth–Moon system.
Launched on December 4, 1996, by NASA aboard a Delta II booster a month after the Mars Global Surveyor, it landed on July 4, 1997, on Mars's Ares Vallis, in a region called Chryse Planitia in the Oxia Palus quadrangle. The lander then opened, exposing the rover which conducted many experiments on the Martian surface. The mission carried a series of scientific instruments to analyze the Martian atmosphere, climate, and geology and the composition of its rocks and soil. It was the second project from NASA's Discovery Program, which promotes the use of low-cost spacecraft and frequent launches under the motto "cheaper, faster and better" promoted by then-administrator Daniel Goldin. The mission was directed by the Jet Propulsion Laboratory (JPL), a division of the California Institute of Technology, responsible for NASA's Mars Exploration Program. The project manager was JPL's Tony Spear.
This mission was the first of a series of missions to Mars that included rovers, and was the first successful lander since the two Vikings landed on Mars in 1976. Although the Soviet Union successfully sent rovers to the Moon as part of the Lunokhod program in the 1970s, its attempts to use rovers in its Mars program failed.
In addition to scientific objectives, the Mars Pathfinder mission was also a "proof-of-concept" for various technologies, such as airbag-mediated touchdown and automated obstacle avoidance, both later exploited by the Mars Exploration Rover mission. The Mars Pathfinder was also remarkable for its extremely low cost relative to other robotic space missions to Mars. Originally, the mission was conceived as the first of the Mars Environmental Survey (MESUR) program.[5]
^ abNelson, Jon. "Mars Pathfinder / Sojourner Rover". NASA. Archived from the original on February 19, 2014. Retrieved February 2, 2014.
^ ab"Mars Pathfinder Fact Sheet". NASA/JPL. March 19, 2005. Archived from the original on September 19, 2014. Retrieved February 21, 2014.
^Conway, Erik (2015). "The Discovery Program: Mars Pathfinder". Jet Propulsion Laboratory. Archived from the original on January 17, 2015. Retrieved June 10, 2015.
^"Mars Pathfinder". NASA. Archived from the original on November 12, 2011. Retrieved June 10, 2015.
^Sawyer, Kathy (November 13, 1993). "One Way or Another, Space Agency Will Hitch a Ride to Mars". Washington Post. Retrieved March 6, 2023.
MarsPathfinder is an American robotic spacecraft that landed a base station with a roving probe on Mars in 1997. It consisted of a lander, renamed the...
other Soviet Mars landing attempts failed. Viking 1 and Viking 2 were first successful NASA landers, launched in 1975. NASA's MarsPathfinder, launched in...
Perseverance remains operational as of March 2024. Sojourner rover, MarsPathfinder, landed successfully on July 4, 1997. Communications were lost on September...
Look up pathfinder in Wiktionary, the free dictionary. Pathfinder, Path Finder or Pathfinders may refer to: MarsPathfinder, a NASA Mars Lander NASA Pathfinder...
S2CID 117853853. Nilsen, E. N. (2012). Exploring Mars: an overview Willcockson, William H. (1999). "MarsPathfinder Heatshield Design and Flight Experience"....
Mars Images". NSSDC - Mars 6 "MarsPathfinder Science Results". NASA. Archived from the original on 2 April 2012. Retrieved 20 September 2015. "Mars Pathfinder...
can be used. The Mars time of noon is 12:00 which is in Earth time 12 hours and 20 minutes after midnight. For the MarsPathfinder, Mars Exploration Rover...
completed was MESUR Pathfinder. MESUR was a planned set of 16 surface missions on Mars that would also set up a planetary network across Mars and work in conjunction...
years in space. The NASA MarsPathfinder, carrying a robotic exploration vehicle Sojourner, landed in the Ares Vallis on Mars in the summer of 1997, returning...
the two Viking program landers in 1976 and MarsPathfinder probe in 1997. The scientific objectives of the Mars Exploration Rover mission were to: Search...
a mission measuring gravity. The name Sojourner was chosen for the MarsPathfinder rover after a year-long, worldwide competition in which students up...
rover projects all counted the sol of touchdown as "Sol 0". MarsPathfinder and the two Mars Exploration Rovers instead defined touchdown as "Sol 1". Generally...
second mission, MarsPathfinder, launched on December 4, 1996, carried the Sojourner rover to Mars. Asteroid 253 Mathilde MarsPathfinder's view of Ares...
Other ILC Dover products include the airbag landing devices for MarsPathfinder and Mars Exploration Rover (MER) missions; lighter-than-air vehicles, including...
Juventae Chasma, as seen by Mars Global Surveyor. These streams begin at the top of a ridge then run together. Pathfinder found temperatures varied on...
Water ice on Mars likeliest areas (December 10, 2019) Mars – Utopia Planitia Almost all water on Mars today exists as ice, though it also exists in small...
P. Smith, University of Arizona, on MarsPathfinder, 1997 The planet Mars is named after the Roman god of war Mars. In Babylonian astronomy, the planet...
considered a difficult landing. Among the successes: Mars 3 – 1971 Viking 1 and Viking 2 – 1976 MarsPathfinder and its Sojourner rover – 1997 Spirit and Opportunity...
projects including Galileo, Cassini, MarsPathfinder, Mars Exploration Rovers (MER). He was the lead engineer of the Mars Science Laboratory's EDL phase (Entry...
military aircraft, before being adapted to space exploration (MarsPathfinder bounced down on Mars on Thiokol airbags) and automotive airbags. Thiokol's generators...
forming hematite. Approximately true-colour in situ images from the MarsPathfinder and Mars Exploration Rover missions indicate that the Martian sky may also...
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