Phoenix landed successfully on Mars

NASA’s Phoenix Lander, the spacecraft sent by NASA, safely touched down the soil in the northern polar region of this red planet on Sunday 25^th of May. Now it’s three months mission. Winter in Mars will start in three months and the solar panels of Phoenix will not work that time.

There’s no water on Mars surface. But in 2002 Mars Odyssey Orbiter (orbiting around Mars and sending data) discovered huge ice reservoirs below the ground (within 1 meter) in this northern polar region of Mars. The Phoenix will dig through the soil to reach the ice, and bring both soil and ice to its platform for analysis. It will study the geologic history and biological potential from the collected samples. 

Phoenix had a 10-months long journey in which it travelled about 422 million miles in the space. Phoenix is already more than 10 hours on Mars surface. 

NASA’s long term Mars exploration program is aimed to know if there was or is life on the planet, to know the climate and geology, and finally to end with human landing.