Two Mars Missions Set For Climax on Friday

Posted by jburk to Mars Polar Lander at November 29, 1999 12:00 PM

If all goes well, Friday will mark the latest chapter in NASA’s ongoing campaign to explore Mars when the Polar Lander and two companion microprobes set down on the red planet. The U.S. space agency hopes to chalk up its fourth spacecraft landing at Mars, a feat it first accomplished with the twin Viking missions in 1976 and again with Pathfinder in 1997. (In 1971, the Soviets became the first to land on Mars.)