Mariner 4 was a NASA spacecraft that was released on November 28, 1964, as part of the Mariner program. Mariner 4s flyby of Mars took location on July 15, 1965, and it returned the very first close-up images of the Martian surface area, revealing a barren, heavily cratered surface with no signs of canals or other features that had actually been previously proposed as proof of Martian civilization.
JPL and the Space Age Video Series
The Changing Face of Mars, reveals through archival footage and interviews with key scientists and engineers, JPLs first functions in exploring the Red Planet, from Mariner 4, through the 1976 arrival of the Viking orbiters and landers.
This picture of Mariner 4 superimposed on an image of Mars was utilized to market the Mariner 4 mission. Credit: NASA
Other than Earth, no world in the solar system has been so thoroughly or long analyzed as Mars. For more than twenty years now NASAs Jet Propulsion Laboratory has constantly checked out the Red Planet with an array of landers, orbiters, and rovers.
What prepared for this unparalleled record of expedition? This 90-minute documentary describes the challenges of JPLs first efforts to send out spacecraft to the Red Planet.
For much of human history, Mars was no more than a tiny reddish dot in the sky. However in 1965 the first spacecraft ever to check out Mars, JPLs Mariner 4, began to change our understanding of the world with its grainy black-and-white images of Mars. The data from Mariner 4 and those that followed had lots of confusing data for the researchers to comprehend.
In 1965 the first spacecraft ever to go to Mars, JPLs Mariner 4, started to change our understanding of the world with its grainy black-and-white images of Mars. Mariner 4 was a NASA spacecraft that was launched on November 28, 1964, as part of the Mariner program. Mariner 4s flyby of Mars took location on July 15, 1965, and it returned the very first close-up images of the Martian surface area, revealing a barren, greatly cratered terrain with no signs of canals or other features that had actually been formerly proposed as evidence of Martian civilization.
