NASA to Announce MSL Landing Site on July 22

In just three days, officials with the American space agency will announce the landing site for the Mars Science Laboratory (MSL) rover Curiosity. The selection process has been extremely long and rigorous, but experts are now convinced that they have the best possible options available.

At this point, only two candidates remain, Gale Crater and Eberswalde Crater. Both have great potential in terms of scientific return, as well as very few drawbacks. Scientists involved in the decision-making process say that any of the two is just as good.

However, they need to make a formal decision. The location of the landing site needs to be computed into MSL's flight trajectory, as well as in the routines controlling the descent of the Sky Crane system that will deploy the rover on the Martian surface.

NASA will announce its final decision during a news conference, to be held at 10 am EDT (1400 GMT), on Friday, July 22. The briefing will be held at the Smithsonian's National Air and Space Museum Moving Beyond Earth Gallery.

A number of officials directly involved with the project will be present, including MSL lead scientist Michael Meyer, who is based at NASA Headquarters, in Washington DC. MSL project scientist John Grotzinger, who is based at the NASA Jet Propulsion Laboratory (JPL), will also be in attendance.

University of California in Davis (UCD) geologist Dawn Sumner, Smithsonian geologist John Grant, and JPL MSL project engineer Michael Watkins will make up the rest of the panel making the critical announcement. The decision process has been going on for a couple of years.

The rover will launch from Space Launch Complex 41 (SLC-41), at the Cape Canaveral Air Force Station (CCAFS). At this point, integration and testing are on track for a launch in late November.

If all goes well, the MSL will depart for Mars aboard an Atlas V delivery system sometime between November 25 and December 18. If this launch window is missed, the next one will come in about 26 months, experts say.

The reason why Eberswalde Crater is so interesting is that it may very well be the fossilized remnant of an ancient river delta. The Holden site is similar in many ways, but in the end “Eberswalde has one or two extra attributes that set it apart,” Grotzinger explained.

Gale Crater is a prime target for observation because it features a 3-mile (5-kilometer) mountain at its center. If Curiosity manages to trek up its slopes, it will be able to analyze rock layers spanning hundred of millions of years.

“Those are chapters in the history of the environmental evolution of Mars,” Grotzinger said.