On 6 August, NASA’s Mars Science Laboratory (MSL) mission will conduct a spectacular landing to deliver Curiosity – the largest planetary rover ever flown – onto the Red Planet.
ESA’s Mars Express will support the mission’s progress, recording crucial flight data right until ‘wheels down’ on the alien surface.
At around 07:10 CEST, Mars Express will point its MELACOM communication antenna towards the trajectory of NASA's MSL and start recording its arrival at the Red Planet early in the morning of the 6th.
The data will provide an important and potentially crucial back-up to NASA's own data and will help reconstruct the entry profile; MSL is also being tracked by NASA's Odyssey and Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter spacecraft.
Furthermore, several of ESA's ESTRACK ground stations – the massive 35m deep-space antennas at Cebreros, Spain, and New Norcia, Australia – will also be involved.
Here's a web report today in the main ESA web portal. For a fuller, more detailed technical overview of Mars Express involvement in NASA's historic mission, click on the 'Page' links below.
Don't miss NASA's great '7 Minutes of Terror video'!
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