Prop's NASA, JPL

[Tazio]

PASADENA, California (Reuters) - NASA's Mars science rover Curiosity performed a daredevil descent through pink Martian skies late on Sunday to clinch an historic landing inside an ancient crater, ready to search for signs the Red Planet may once have harbored key ingredients for life.

Mission controllers burst into applause and cheers as they received signals confirming that the car-sized rover had survived a perilous seven-minute descent NASA called the most elaborate and difficult feat in the annals of robotic spaceflight.

Engineers said the tricky landing sequence, combining a giant parachute with a rocket-pack that lowered the rover to the Martian surface on a tether, allowed for zero margin for error.

"I can't believe this. This is unbelievable," enthused Allen Chen, the deputy head of the rover's descent and landing team at the Jet Propulsion Laboratory near Los Angeles.

Simply amazing.

[Dave B]

@MarsCuriosity on Twitter - and the little fella's got a sense of humour

I don't suppose it fancies looking for Beagle II while it's up there....

[Tazio]

Image Caption: Landing ellipse for Curiosity rover inside Gale Crater at the foot of Mount Sharp on Mars and will attempt to climb the mountain later in the mission. Credit: NASA

[Ninar69]

Incredible achievement. And 1/6th cost of olympics.

[airshifter]

I drove by some of the huge buildings and supporting structures at NASA Langley earlier today, and just the sight of them made me smile. It's amazing what humans can do when they have a goal.

For me the earlier days of space travel and in particular the Apollo missions are just fascinating. They did a lot without much tech to really support them.

As for leadership abilities for individuals, I personally consider Gene Kranz one of the best leaders in our nations history. Complete trust and faith in his people and the ability to pull them together seem to be a natural thing for him. If any of you ever have the chance to watch the Discovery channel series "When We Left Earth" watch it and you'll see what I'm talking about. IIRC the average age of the flight controllers and systems engineers that put man on the moon was 26 or 27 years old. Not bad for a bunch of youngsters.

[Tazio]

I drove by some of the huge buildings and supporting structures at NASA Langley earlier today, and just the sight of them made me smile. It's amazing what humans can do when they have a goal.

For me the earlier days of space travel and in particular the Apollo missions are just fascinating. They did a lot without much tech to really support them.

As for leadership abilities for individuals, I personally consider Gene Kranz one of the best leaders in our nations history. Complete trust and faith in his people and the ability to pull them together seem to be a natural thing for him. If any of you ever have the chance to watch the Discovery channel series "When We Left Earth" watch it and you'll see what I'm talking about. IIRC the average age of the flight controllers and systems engineers that put man on the moon was 26 or 27 years old. Not bad for a bunch of youngsters.

Thanks Air',
I remember being at Ron Slater's house and The moon landing was happening that night. Apaprently everything went just fine except homey said "One step for man, One giant leap for mankind. When what he was sopposed to say was "One step for a man one giant leap for Bla bla bla .........2..