Jul 6 1997
From The Space Library
Sojourner, the roving vehicle carried to Mars aboard Pathfinder, began prospecting the surface of the Red Planet approximately two days after Pathfinder's safe landing. NASA engineers and enthralled scientists described the scene of the six-wheeled, microwave-sized Sojourner, slowly descending the ramp of Pathfinder, as similar to Neil A. Armstrong's "giant leap" in 1969. Richard A. Cook, managing the mission from JPL, set off a raucous celebration of NASA engineers when he announced, "The rover is on the surface of Mars. We've got some great images back, and all the scientists are in heaven." Weather reports gathered by the Pathfinder reported that Sojourner was working in temperatures as high as 8° below 0°F (-22°C), as well as in wind and dust storms. Sojourner, named for black abolitionist Sojourner Truth, headed for a dark rock near Pathfinder, as its first object of close study. NASA scientists, who had named the rock Barnacle Bill because of its craggy appearance, used similarly whimsical terms to keep track of the various geological objects studied by Sojourner. Sojourner's success, after some minor complication upon landing, encouraged mission scientists and drew wide acclaim from the media. Scientists began to speculate almost immediately, about whether the mission could possibly confirm or deny the existence of life on the planet.
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