Bishop Museum to Monitor Mars Rover Landing

Mars Science Laboratory rendering image courtesy NASA.

By Wendy Osher

The Bishop Museum in Honolulu will monitor the landing of the Mars rover, Curiosity, when it touches down on Sunday night, August 5, 2012.

The Bishop Museum will run a NASA webcast of the landing, which is scheduled to occur at 7:31 p.m., Hawai’i Standard Time.

Curiosity is described as the largest, most complex rover ever sent to Mars, and arguably the most complex robot ever sent into the solar system.

The mission is aimed at returning high-definition images of Mars to Earth, and conducting microscopic examination of the planet’s soil.

The rover, which is roughly the size of an SUV, will land about five degrees south of the Martian equator in an area known as the Gale Crater.

More information on the Mars Science Laboratory Landing and mission is available at the following URL: www.nasa.gov/mission_pages/msl/index.html.