SCIENCE: Mars Express set to deploy radar

[conjur]

http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/science/nature/4498055.stm

A radar on the Mars Express spacecraft which will look for water and ice under the Red Planet is due to be deployed after a delay of over a year.

Controllers are worried the radar's long antenna booms will swing back and hit delicate components on the probe.

Deployment will take place in a window from 2 to 12 May, with the Marsis instrument's three booms set to open out of the spacecraft separately.

The radar altimeter will search for water up to 5km (3 miles) beneath Mars.

Results from the instrument are eagerly awaited; it is thought the greatest reservoir of retained water on the Red Planet could be found beneath the planet's surface.

Some think such underground reservoirs could provide a habitat for microbial life.

Looks like the delay won't be much more than a week. But, oh, how I'd love to see the plans for a manned mission to Mars actually start to take place. Imagine what more could be done with men/women on the planet!

 

[Farmer]

I would actually like to see more missions to the moon before one to Mars; it seems like a more immediate step.

 

[1EZduzit]

First we need a decent space station. Then go to Mars, that is if they find water. The moon can wait, we've been there and done that.