[meteorite-list] NASA Begins Launch Preparations for Next Mars Mission (MAVEN)

[Ron Baalke]

August 5, 2013

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

Nancy Jones
Goddard Space Flight Center, Greenbelt, Md.
301-286-0039
nancy.n.jones at nasa.gov 

RELEASE 13-244
     
NASA Begins Launch Preparations for Next Mars Mission

NASA's next spacecraft going to Mars arrived Friday, Aug. 2, at the agency's  
Kennedy Space Center in Florida, and is now perched in a cleanroom to begin  
final preparations for its November launch.

The Mars Atmosphere and Volatile Evolution (MAVEN) spacecraft is undergoing  
detailed testing and fueling prior to being moved to its launch pad. The  
mission has a 20-day launch period that opens Nov. 18.

The spacecraft will conduct the first mission dedicated to surveying the  
upper atmosphere of Mars. Scientists expect to obtain unprecedented data that  
will help them understand how the loss of atmospheric gas to space may have  
played a part in changing the planet's climate.

"We're excited and proud to ship the spacecraft right on schedule," said  
David Mitchell, MAVEN project manager at NASA's Goddard Space Flight Center  
in Greenbelt, Md. "But more critical milestones lie ahead before we  
accomplish our mission of collecting science data from Mars. I firmly believe  
the team is up to the task. Now we begin the final push to launch."

Over the weekend, the team confirmed the spacecraft arrived in good  
condition. They removed the spacecraft from the shipping container and  
secured it to a rotation fixture in the cleanroom. In the next week, the team  
will reassemble components previously removed for transport. Further checks  
prior to launch will include software tests, spin balance tests, and test  
deployments of the spacecraft's solar panels and booms.

The spacecraft was transported from Buckley Air Force Base in Aurora, Colo.,  
on Friday, aboard a U.S. Air Force C-17 cargo plane. Lockheed Martin Space  
Systems in Littleton, Colo., designed and built the spacecraft and is  
responsible for testing, launch processing, and mission operations.

"It's always a mix of excitement and stress when you ship a spacecraft down  
to the launch site," said Guy Beutelschies, MAVEN program manager at Lockheed  
Martin. "It's similar to moving your children to college after high school  
graduation. You're proud of the hard work to get to this point, but you know  
they still need some help before they're ready to be on their own."

Previous Mars missions detected energetic solar fields and particles that  
could drive atmospheric gases away from Mars. Unlike Earth, Mars does not  
have a planet-wide magnetic field that would deflect these solar winds. As a  
result, these winds may have stripped away much of Mars' atmosphere.

MAVEN's data will help scientists reconstruct the planet's past climate.  
Scientists will use MAVEN data to project how Mars became the cold, dusty  
desert planet we see today. The planned one-year mission begins with the  
spacecraft entering the Red Planet's orbit in September 2014.

"MAVEN is not going to detect life," said Bruce Jakosky, planetary scientist  
at the University of Colorado Boulder and MAVEN's principal investigator.  
"But it will help us understand the climate history, which is the history of  
its habitability."

MAVEN's principal investigator is based at the University of Colorado  
Laboratory for Atmospheric and Space Physics in Boulder. The university  
provides science instruments and leads science operations, education and  
public outreach.

Goddard manages the project and provides two of the science instruments for  
the mission. Lockheed Martin built the spacecraft and is responsible for  
mission operations. The University of California at Berkeley's Space Sciences  
Laboratory provides science instruments for the mission. NASA's Jet  
Propulsion Laboratory in Pasadena, Calif., provides navigation support, Deep  
Space Network support, and Electra telecommunications relay hardware and  
operations.

To learn more about the MAVEN mission, visit:

http://www.nasa.gov/maven 

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