[meteorite-list] Watch Construction Of NASA's New Mars Rover Live On The Web (Curiosity)

[Ron Baalke]

Oct. 21, 2010

Dwayne Brown 
Headquarters, Washington      
202-358-1726 
dwayne.c.brown at nasa.gov 

Guy Webster 
Jet Propulsion Laboratory, Pasadena, Calif. 
818-354-6278 
guy.webster at jpl.nasa.gov 

RELEASE: 10-264

WATCH CONSTRUCTION OF NASA'S NEW MARS ROVER LIVE ON THE WEB

PASADENA, Calif. -- A newly installed webcam is giving the public an 
opportunity to watch technicians assemble and test the next NASA Mars 
rover, one of the most technologically challenging interplanetary 
missions ever designed. 

NASA's Mars Science Laboratory, also known as the Curiosity rover, is 
in a clean room at the agency's Jet Propulsion Laboratory in 
Pasadena, Calif. The webcam, affectionately called "Curiosity Cam," 
provides the video feed, without audio, from a viewing gallery above 
the clean room floor. The video will be supplemented periodically by 
live Web chats featuring Curiosity team members answering questions 
about the rover. Currently, work in the clean room begins at 8 a.m. 
PDT Monday through Friday. 

Clean room technicians have been busy adding new avionics and 
instruments to the rover. Beginning Friday, viewers will see 
technicians carefully add the rover's suspension system and its six 
wheels. On Monday, Oct. 25, the rover's 7-foot-long robotic arm will 
be carefully lifted and attached to the front of the rover. 

The camera shows a portion of the clean room that is typically active; 
but the rover, spacecraft components and technicians may move out of 
view as work shifts to other areas of the room. When activity takes 
place in other testing facilities around JPL, the clean room may be 
empty. The camera also may be turned off periodically for maintenance 
or due to technical issues. 

Months of assembly and testing remain before the car-sized rover is 
ready for launch from Cape Canaveral, Fla. The rover and spacecraft 
components will ship to NASA's Kennedy Space Center in Florida next 
spring. The launch will occur between Nov. 25 and Dec. 18, 2011. 
Curiosity will arrive on Mars in August 2012. 

Curiosity is engineered to drive longer distances over rougher terrain 
than previous rovers with a science payload 10 times the mass of 
instruments on NASA's Spirit and Opportunity. 

The new, large rover will investigate whether the landing region has 
had environments favorable for supporting microbial life and for 
preserving evidence about whether life existed on the Red Planet. 

Continuous live video of rover construction is available at: 

http://www.ustream.tv/channel/nasajpl 

and 

http://www.nasa.gov/mission_pages/msl/building_curiosity.html 

For information and news about Curiosity, visit: 

http://www.nasa.gov/msl 

Social media audiences can learn more about the mission on Twitter 
@MarsCuriosity or on Facebook at: 

http://www.facebook.com/MarsCuriosity 

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