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Posts: 33268
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12 years ago
A map of every extraterrestrial space mission
NASA is all set to launch Curiosity, the most advanced (and expensive) Mars rover to date, on Saturday. Curiosity will land in Gale Crater, on the surface of Mars, to investigate a three-mile-high (5km) mountain with its impressive array of drills, lasers, scoops, and other scientific tools for signs of life.
Curiosity, like its Spirit, Opportunity, Pathfinder, Viking, and Phoenix forebears, will send imagery back to Earth and analyse rock samples using an internal, robotic laboratory. Curiosity is also the template on which the European Space Agency and NASA will base ExoMars, a Mars rover that launches in 2018.
Anyway, don’t excited just yet: It will take nine months for Curiosity to travel the 354 million miles (570 million km) to Mars, and considering the (seemingly) sad fate of the Russian Phobos-Grunt probe, we should really just spend the next few months thinking happy thoughts. In the meantime, though, take a look at this awesome map of every (as of 2009) deep space, extraterrestrial space mission. Personally, I had no idea that we’d flown that many missions to Mars and Venus, or Jupiter for that matter. At this point, it’s always humbling to remember that we’ve still only sent four objects — two Pioneers and two Voyagers — beyond the Solar System.
Be sure to click the image for a full-size version.
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