As the newest Mars craft approached its critical rendezvous with the red planet yesterday, NASA specialists were watching anxiously from Earth, mindful of the number of things that had gone wrong in the past.
The Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter (MRO) started slowing down last month after travelling nearly 500 million kilometers in less than seven months, and was to maneuver into orbit around the planet at 5:25am today.
If the maneuver fails, the probe could skip past Mars to be claimed by the universe beyond.
The maneuver is difficult because the control center in Pasadena, California, will lose communications with the craft for a half an hour while the orbiter flies around the far side of Mars.
The mission was entering a "very critical phase" in the coming days, said NASA scientist Fuk Li during a press conference on Wednesday. Only two of the four attempts to put expeditions in orbit around Mars in the last 15 years had succeeded, which Li said were "sobering" odds.
Mars is interesting for researchers because it is most like the Earth. It's also the only planet that could be visited by humans in the foreseeable future -- according to NASA plans, perhaps in 20 years.
NASA is looking for a good landing place for the Phoenix probe in 2007 and a Mars laboratory in 2009.
NASA aims to greatly expand its scientific understanding of the red planet, collecting more data than all previous Mars missions combined.
"This mission will ... pave the way for future robotic missions later in this decade, and help us prepare for sending humans to Mars," said Doug McCuistion, NASA's Director of the Mars Exploration Program, last month.
Over the next six months, the probe's orbit will gradually drop near enough to gather information -- about 300km above the planet's surface.
NASA said the probe carries the most powerful telescopic camera ever sent to another planet, with the capacity to capture rocks the size of a small desk.
NASA is particularly interested in finding any water on the planet and tracking down past water traces to help determine if Mars ever supported life.
Yesterday, the journal Science was to publish an article showing that NASA's Cassini probe had found what could be water on Saturn's moon Enceladus.
The probe's descent will include hundreds of carefully calculated dips into the upper atmosphere -- a process called aerobraking -- that will lower it into smaller orbits.
"Aerobraking is like a high-wire act in open air," said Jim Graf, NASA's orbiter project manager in a telecast news conference. "It's a dangerous part of the mission."
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