Mars craft drops perfectly into orbit, to whoops of relief

PASADENA, Calif. — NASA's Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter (MRO) completed a flawless 310-million-mile trip Friday to sweep smartly into orbit around Mars, dropping out of radio contact behind the planet for a nail-biting half hour, then re-emerging on schedule.

"Look at that!" yelled one engineer at Mission Control at the Jet Propulsion Laboratory in Pasadena, Calif. "Right on the money!" another shouted.

"It was picture-perfect," Project Manager Jim Graf told NASA television. "We couldn't have scripted it any better. It reappeared from behind Mars almost to the second."

Engineers had awaited the moment of "orbit insertion" with a certain amount of dread. Four Mars-bound spacecraft have been lost in the past eight years, and 21 of 35 have failed during the 45-year history of missions to the planet.

Friday's success meant Mars has four functioning spacecraft in orbit. The $450 million MRO will survey the planet during a mission designed for two years, but engineers say it could easily operate — at least for relaying communications — for more than a decade.

"We are sending the most capable spacecraft that we have ever sent to Mars, and the most technologically advanced payload we have ever sent to another planet," Graf said.

The MRO joins NASA's Mars Global Surveyor and Mars Odyssey and the European Space Agency's Mars Express, which have been mapping the planet the past few years. On the surface, the NASA rovers Spirit and Opportunity continue their missions.

The spacecraft, built by Lockheed Martin, is expected to return more data than all previous Mars probes put together. The $720 million mission is being managed by the Jet Propulsion Laboratory.

"This spacecraft is going to rewrite the science textbooks on Mars," Graf said.

The spacecraft won't beam back data until November. It will seek evidence of ancient water and other signs that the planet could have been hospitable to life.

The 2-ton, school bus-size probe carries the largest telescope ever launched beyond Earth's orbit, and researchers hope it will provide surface pictures of unusual resolution and clarity, imaging items as small as a foot across.

Scientists think it might provide pictures of Spirit and Opportunity and the crash sites of failed missions, such as the European Space Agency's lost Beagle 2 probe.

MRO has been cruising toward Mars at about 7,000 mph since its launch from Cape Canaveral Air Force Station in Florida on Aug. 12. As it entered Mars' gravity well Friday morning, it accelerated to more than 11,000 mph.

The onboard computer fired the craft's six engines at 1:24 p.m. PST, initiating a burn that consumed 230 gallons of fuel and slowed the craft by 2,200 mph.

The last six minutes of the burn were carried out after the orbiter had gone behind Mars, out of sight of Earth. Engineers waited anxiously until it emerged from Mars' shadow on schedule at 2:16 p.m., and its signal was reacquired by the antennas of NASA's Deep Space Network system.

A few moments later, navigators confirmed that "Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter is in orbit around the planet Mars."

The orbital insertion maneuver was considered one of the critical phases of the mission. NASA lost two orbiters — the Mars Observer in 1993 and the Mars Climate Orbiter in 1999 — during that phase.

"It's clear we learned from our mistakes," said Colleen Hartman, NASA deputy associate administrator.

The craft entered a highly elliptical orbit ranging from a low point of 264.5 miles above the planet's surface to a maximum of 28,000 miles.

Beginning at the end of March and continuing for six months, the craft will carry out a procedure called aerobraking, dipping into Mars' atmosphere 550 times to be slowed by friction. Ultimately, it will enter a two-hour polar orbit at an altitude of 190 miles.

Once parked above Mars, the craft's high-resolution camera will allow scientists to see large rocks on the Martian surface, helping them choose potential landing sites.

A smaller imaging spectrophotometer will survey the surface in infrared and ultraviolet light to identify minerals, especially those that might be associated with water. Another camera, called the context camera, will take black-and-white pictures of a 20-mile-wide swath to identify sites where high-resolution imaging will be conducted.

The Mars color imager will show daily global views of the atmosphere and surface to provide weather maps, track surface changes and identify the composition of clouds. The Mars climate sounder will study water vapor, dust, ice and temperatures in the atmosphere.

The final instrument is a ground-penetrating radar that will look for ice under the surface and other geological features.

The orbiter will also relay data from other Martian missions, including the Phoenix Mars Scout, scheduled for launch in 2007.

The craft was designed to operate in Martian orbit until 2010, but engineers said it has enough fuel to continue through 2014.

"Now we have a permanent scientific presence on another planet," said Jet Propulsion Laboratory director Charles Elachi.

Material from The Associated Press is included in this report.