From: Stig Agermose <stig.agermose@get2net.dk>
Date: Tue, 29 Jun 1999 02:19:39
Fwd Date: Tue, 29 Jun 1999 11:22:49 -0400
Subject: Mars Lander And Possibly Life Sites Eyed


Source: Discovery (Channel) News Brief,

http://www.discovery.com/news/briefs/brief4.html?ct=37780d5e

Stig

***

Mars Lander Sites Eyed

**

Scientists gathered at the University of Buffalo last week to
choose a landing site for a planned 2001 Mars mission amid
rumors that NASA budget cuts might scuttle the mission.

The Mars Surveyor 2001 Landing Site Workshop convened June 22-24
to select a range of potential targets, according to mission
manager Dave Spencer of NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory.

According to Spencer, conference participants agreed on five
categories for the 2001 landing: Mars' ancient highlands;
layered deposits in the Valles Marineris (the so-called "Grand
Canyon of Mars'); sites known to contain iron; ancient lakebeds;
and anci ent hydrothermal, or hot spring, regions.

The hot springs would be "everyone's top choice" because it
would present the best candidate for possible evidence of past
life, says Spencer. "Unfortunately, it's the only one of the
five we haven't identified at any location."

He adds that an instrument aboard a Mars orbiter now en route to
the planet might be able to pick out such a region later this
year.

Meanwhile, the Mars Global Surveyor will take high resolution
images of approximately 40 possible sites that fit the first
four categories.

Spencer expects the primary landing site to be announced in
January.

Three days before the conference began, a Planetary Society
press alert said both the 2001 mission and a comet lander called
Champollion had been canceled by NASA headquarters.

The Planetary Society is a nonprofit organization co-founded by
the late Carl Sagan to promote planetary exploration.

"We heard a rumor," says Louis Friedman, the society's executive
director. "There's no question that NASA has a budget problem,
but there's also no question that the public supports Mars
exploration. We decided that public attention was needed to save
the mission."

According to Friedman, the ploy worked, and NASA backed down on
canceling the Mars mission, although he says the comet lander
still faces the ax.

"There was conversation about it," says Spencer of the rumored
cut. "But the scuttlebutt is that we're out of danger for the
moment."


By Michael Ray Taylor, Discovery News Brief

Picture: Malin Space Science Systems/NASA


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