Tonight: Robots on Mars, hunting for life on Mars?

By at 11:16 am Saturday, Jan 3

Magic may happen this evening. The USA will attempt to safely land a scientific golf cart on Mars at about 8.30pm, California time:
Two NASA (news - web sites) Mars landers -- Spirit and Opportunity -- are speeding toward "sweet spot" touch down sites at different, but scientifically attractive locations on Earth's mysterious neighbor.

The opening act in this $820 million drama to place dual robot geologists on Mars is the landing of the Mars Exploration Rover (MER) dubbed Spirit tonight at about 8:35 p.m. Pacific Standard Time (PST). The target: Gusev Crater -- a possible former lake in a giant impact crater on Mars. Primary among the mission's scientific goals is to search for and characterize a wide range of rocks and soils that hold clues to past water activity on Mars

Link to news story, Link to NASA Mars Rover home page. (Thanks, John!)

Xeni Jardin

Boing Boing partner, Boing Boing Video host and executive producer. Xeni.net, Twitter, Google+. Email: xeni@xeni.net.

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