MSL Curiosity to Land in 20 Days

For those of you who might not have heard, the Mars Science Laboratory Curiosity - the most advanced human-made object ever sent to another world - will be landing on Mars Aug 6 2012 at approximately 1:31AM Eastern Daylight Time, or if you prefer, 10:31 pm Aug 5 2012 on the West Coast (or, more appropriately 5:30 am UTC).

While its true that we've been to Mars before, gigantic questions still linger unapologetically in our faces...Questions like, "Did Mars ever have life?" or "Was Mars truly ever a wet planet?" or "Can Mars support Human colonization?" or "What happened to Mars, to its magnetosphere, to turn a perfectly good world into a cold, barren platform for the political maneuvers of the Baron Vladimir Harkonnen?"

The fact is, we know very, very little still about our nearest planetary neighbor. What we can tease out of Mars over the next few years with Curiosity is going to add much to the Search for Life, to our understanding of what is required of a rocky planet to support the creation of life. Mars and Earth are so very similar in many ways, so much so that it appears now, in this pre-Curiosity period, that we are dealing with a kind of Tale of Two Planets. Earth and Mars both seemingly started in the same situation billions of years ago and took two different paths in their planetary lives - Earth headed for the whole teeming-with-life gig while Mars got the Tatooine treatment.

Gale Crater & Curiosity landing zone in upper left

Where is Curiosity headed? What does it expect to find? Curiosity is slated to land in Gale Crater, an impact crater with a 15,000-18,000 foot mountain called Aeolis Mons (or, more recently nicknamed Mount Sharp) in the middle (which exists due to the nature of the impact event). Gale Crater led the top of a short list of scientifically interesting targets to put a rover as complex as Curiosity down into. One of the best reasons why Gale was selected is because of the exposed strata in that crater - scientists expect to see much deeper into Martian geologic history than ever before because of how deep the crater is. Billions of years of history may be sitting in that crater exposed, and if Curiosity can get to it, then we could gain additional insight in the development of the planet itself and its potentially life-rich, water-filled younger days. Curiosity will even be able to hand in homework on the whole Mars methane debate, which we will discuss in a more detailed post soon.

Curiosity is outfitted with the best scientific equipment imaginable, making it a potential ancestor to future Federation Shuttlecraft. It will answer questions regarding the presence of life, the geology of Mars, the climate of Mars and help us ascertain the prospect of Human colonization. Also, it has one of the craziest landing sequences ever devised. Check out the NASA JPL video below on how that landing sequence is designed to work out, the now famous "7 Minutes of Terror" video. Also, there are a number of Curiosity landing Parties scheduled around the globe. I know I will be participating in one in Orange Beach, Alabama. Locate one near you and get in on the action. The landing will be broadcast live on the internet, across many different platforms including the official Twitter account for the Curiosity Rover and on Xbox Live (also, look for the Mars Curiosity landing game on Xbox Live for the Xbox Kinect). So check it out. We will provide a "Where-to-Watch" factsheet in the coming week, so that you can have all those links on one place.

And if you are going to be in the Pasadena, California area, don't miss The Planetary Society's Planetfest. See video below for details: