Aerial search turns up no trace of Mars Polar Lander

This image, taken earlier this year by the Global Surveyor, shows the targeted landing zone of the Polar Lander

In this story: Looking for a parachute in the martian dust Using Pathfinder as a test case RELATED STORIES, SITES

December 31, 1999
Web posted at: 11:26 a.m. EST (1626 GMT)

(CNN) -- Scientists trying to track down the Mars Polar Lander reported this week that an initial search conducted last week failed to find any trace of the lost probe.

Scientists at Malin Space Science Systems in San Diego aimed a powerful camera on the orbiting Mars Global Surveyor at the lander's intended touchdown site, but the images it captured showed no sign of the $165 million spacecraft.

"We completed the initial search Christmas Eve," said Mike Ravine, Advanced Projects Manager for Malin. "They (the images) came down fine and we don't find anything in the picture that looks like the lander or the parachute."

The Polar Lander was supposed to land December 3 for a 90-day mission to analyze the martian atmosphere and search for buried water. NASA lost contact with it after it started its descent.

Looking for a parachute in the martian dust

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Spotting the lander itself was considered a long shot, but scientists had hoped Global Surveyor would be able to spot the lander's white, 65-foot-long (21-meter-long) parachute, which would have contrasted with the planet's red dust.

"It was worth doing," Ravine said. "It wasn't a good bet, but it was about the only possibility we had."

Ravine said scientists at NASA's Jet Propulsion Lab in Pasadena, California, will now examine the data gathered by Surveyor and decide where to go from here.

"It was a lot of work to do this," he said. "But it's in everybody's interest to find out what happened to the lander."

Using Pathfinder as a test case

The Global Surveyor satellite entered orbit around Mars on September 11, 1997, for a two-year mission to map the entire planet by taking high-resolution pictures of the martian surface. But it wasn't designed to search for lost objects.

To practice looking for the lander, scientists are trying to photograph another probe, one they know they can find -- the Mars Pathfinder.

Global Surveyor was a highly successful NASA spacecraft that landed on Mars on Friday, July 4, 1997. Scientists know where Pathfinder is located, so it should be much easier to spot than the Polar Lander. If Surveyor can spot Pathfinder, those images will be used as a "test case" to determine Surveyor's ability to take pictures that show small objects on the surface of Mars.

It's a "test case of how well this thing (Surveyor's camera) can image things on the ground," said Ravine. He said it would help scientists decide whether or not they're wasting their time using Surveyor to search for the missing probe.

Ravine said Surveyor already had one try at snapping the Pathfinder. If flew over it December 26 and snapped some pictures, but missed Pathfinder by a couple of miles.

The next photo op for Pathfinder is at the end of next week. Ravine said the weather on Mars looks good and if it holds, scientists may get a good picture.