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Mars-bound craft tweaks course, passes halfway point NASA/JPL NEWS RELEASE Posted: November 18, 2005 NASA's Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter successfully fired six engines for about 20 seconds today to adjust its flight path in advance of its March 10, 2006, arrival at the red planet.
"Today's maneuver mainly increases the speed to bring us to the target point at just the right moment," said Tung-hanYou, chief of the Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter navigation team at NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory, Pasadena, Calif. The intended nudge in velocity is 75 centimeters per second (less than 2 miles per hour). The spacecraft's speed relative to the sun is about 27 kilometers per second (61,000 miles per hour). Four opportunities for course adjustments were planned into the schedule before launch. Today's, the second, used only the trajectory-correction engines. Each engine produces about 18 newtons (4 pounds) of thrust. The first course adjustment, on Aug. 27, doubled as a test of the six main engines, which produce nearly eight times as much thrust. Those main engines will have the big job of slowing the spacecraft enough to be captured into orbit when it reaches Mars. The next scheduled trajectory adjustment, on Feb. 1, 2006, and another one 10 days before arrival will be used, if necessary, for fine tuning, said JPL's Allen Halsell, the mission's deputy navigation chief. The Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter mission will examine Mars in unprecedented detail from low orbit. Its instrument payload will study water distribution -- including ice, vapor or liquid -- as well as geologic features and minerals. The orbiter will also support future missions to Mars by examining potential landing sites and by providing a high-data-rate relay for communications back to Earth. The mission is managed by JPL, a division of the California Institute of Technology, Pasadena, for the NASA Science Mission Directorate. Lockheed Martin Space Systems, Denver, is the prime contractor for the project and built the spacecraft. |
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