Mariner 4 (together with Mariner 3 known as Mariner-Mars 1964) was the fourth in a series of spacecraft intended for planetary exploration in a flyby mode. It was designed to conduct closeup scientific observations of Mars and to transmit these observations to Earth. Launched on November 28, 1964, Mariner 4 performed the first successful flyby of the planet Mars, returning the first close-up pictures of the Martian surface. It captured the first images of another planet ever returned from deep space; their depiction of a cratered, seemingly dead world largely changed the scientific community's view of life on Mars. Other mission objectives were to perform field and particle measurements in interplanetary space in the vicinity of Mars and to provide experience in and knowledge of the engineering capabilities for interplanetary flights of long duration.
Introduction
Mariner 4
Mariner 4 | Introduction
A flyby mode It was just a fly by. Flyby. It was the first successful flyby.
what is the location of mars in the solar system
user
Mars is the fourth planet from the Sun
assistant
is it known by any other names?
user
Yes, "Red Planet" in English
assistant
are there any volcanoes there?
user
Yes, Olympus Mons
assistant
who named it?
user
Named after observations made by Mariner 9
assistant
what was that?
user
From Nix Olympica; a volcano. Astronomers adopted the name "Olympus Mons" for the albedo feature known as Nix Olympica
assistant
was that a spaceship that made the observations?
user
It was a robotic space probe
assistant
have any other space probes landed on the planet discussed above?
user
Yes, "Mariner 4", "Viking 1", etc
assistant
did the first one land on the planet or was it just a fly by?
user
Solar pressure vanes, each with an area of 0.65 square meter (seven ft²), were attached to the tips of the solar panels. Positional information was provided by four Sun sensors, and a sensor for either the Earth, Mars, or the star Canopus, depending on the time in its spaceflight. Mariner 4 was the first space probe that needed a star for a navigational reference object, since earlier missions, which remained near either the Earth, the Moon, or the planet Venus, had sighted onto either the bright face of the home planet or the brightly lit target. During this flight, both the Earth and Mars would be too dim to lock onto.
Mariner 4 | Spacecraft and subsystems
Mars has been explored by several uncrewed spacecraft. "Mariner 4" was the first spacecraft to visit Mars; launched by NASA on 28 November 1964, it made its closest approach to the planet on 15 July 1965. "Mariner 4" detected the weak Martian radiation belt, measured at about 0.1% that of Earth, and captured the first images of another planet from deep space. The Soviet "Mars 3" mission included a lander, which achieved a soft landing in December 1971; however, contact was lost seconds after touchdown. On 20 July 1976, "Viking 1" performed the first successful landing on the Martian surface.
Mars | Introduction
Mariner 2 becomes the first probe to reach another planet, flying past Venus in December. NASA follows this with the successful Mariner 4 mission to Mars in 1965, both the US and Russia send many more probes to planets through the rest of the 1960s and 1970s.
Timeline of astronomy | 1962
Upon its arrival at Mars on November 13, 1971, Mariner 9 became the first space probe to maintain orbit around another planet.
Space probe | Mariner 9
In 1964, NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory made two attempts at reaching Mars. Mariner 3 and Mariner 4 were identical spacecraft designed to carry out the first flybys of Mars. Mariner 3 was launched on November 5, 1964, but the shroud encasing the spacecraft atop its rocket failed to open properly, dooming the mission. Three weeks later, on November 28, 1964, Mariner 4 was launched successfully on a 7½-month voyage to Mars.. Mariner 4 flew past Mars on July 14, 1965, providing the first close-up photographs of another planet. The pictures, gradually played back to Earth from a small tape recorder on the probe, showed impact craters.
Exploration of Mars | Mariner program
Mariner 4 (together with Mariner 3 known as Mariner-Mars 1964) was the fourth in a series of spacecraft intended for planetary exploration in a flyby mode. It was designed to conduct closeup scientific observations of Mars and to transmit these observations to Earth. Launched on November 28, 1964, Mariner 4 performed the first successful flyby of the planet Mars, returning the first close-up pictures of the Martian surface. It captured the first images of another planet ever returned from deep space; their depiction of a cratered, seemingly dead world largely changed the scientific community's view of life on Mars. Other mission objectives were to perform field and particle measurements in interplanetary space in the vicinity of Mars and to provide experience in and knowledge of the engineering capabilities for interplanetary flights of long duration.
Mariner 4 | Introduction
First successful in-place analysis of another planet. It may have also been the first space probe to impact the surface of another planet, although it is unclear whether it reached Venus' surface. Launched in 1967.
Space probe | <a href="Venera%204">Venus 4</a>
Venus was the first target of interplanetary flyby and lander missions and, despite one of the most hostile surface environments in the Solar System, has had more landers sent to it (nearly all from the Soviet Union) than any other planet in the Solar System. The first flyby was the 1961 Venera 1, though the 1962 Mariner 2 was the first flyby to successfully return data. Mariner 2 has been followed by several other flybys by multiple space agencies often as part of missions using a Venus flyby to provide a gravitational assist en route to other celestial bodies. In 1967 Venera 4 became the first probe to enter and directly examine the atmosphere of Venus.
Space exploration | Venus
Mariner 9 (Mariner Mars '71 / Mariner-I) was a robotic space probe that contributed greatly to the exploration of Mars and was part of the NASA Mariner program. Mariner 9 was launched toward Mars on May 30, 1971 from LC-36B at Cape Canaveral Air Force Station, Florida, and reached the planet on November 14 of the same year, becoming the first spacecraft to orbit another planet – only narrowly beating the Soviet probes "Mars 2" (launched May 19) and "Mars 3" (launched May 28), which both arrived at Mars only weeks later. After the occurrence of dust storms on the planet for several months following its arrival, the orbiter managed to send back clear pictures of the surface.
Mariner 9 | Introduction
Starting in 1960, the Soviets launched a series of probes to Mars including the first intended flybys and hard (impact) landing (Mars 1962B). The first successful flyby of Mars was on 14–15 July 1965, by NASA's Mariner 4. On November 14, 1971, Mariner 9 became the first space probe to orbit another planet when it entered into orbit around Mars. The amount of data returned by probes increased dramatically as technology improved. The first to contact the surface were two Soviet probes: Mars 2 lander on November 27 and Mars 3 lander on December 2, 1971Mars 2 failed during descent and Mars 3 about twenty seconds after the first Martian soft landing.
Exploration of Mars | Past and current missions
Mariner 4 probe performed the first successful flyby of the planet Mars, returning the first pictures of the Martian surface in 1965. The photographs showed an arid Mars without rivers, oceans, or any signs of life. Further, it revealed that the surface (at least the parts that it photographed) was covered in craters, indicating a lack of plate tectonics and weathering of any kind for the last 4 billion years. The probe also found that Mars has no global magnetic field that would protect the planet from potentially life-threatening cosmic rays. The probe was able to calculate the atmospheric pressure on the planet to be about 0.6 kPa (compared to Earth's 101.3 kPa), meaning that liquid water could not exist on the planet's surface.
Life on Mars | Mariner 4
Mariner 2 (Mariner-Venus 1962), an American space probe to Venus, was the first robotic space probe to conduct a successful planetary encounter. The first successful spacecraft in the NASA Mariner program, it was a simplified version of the Block I spacecraft of the Ranger program and an exact copy of Mariner 1. The missions of the Mariner 1 and 2 spacecraft are sometimes known as the Mariner R missions. Original plans called for the probes to be launched on the Atlas-Centaur, but serious developmental problems with that vehicle forced a switch to the much smaller Agena B second stage. As such, the design of the Mariner R vehicles was greatly simplified.
Mariner 2 | Introduction
The first interplanetary flyby was the 1961 Venera 1 flyby of Venus, though the 1962 Mariner 2 was the first flyby of Venus to return data (closest approach 34,773 kilometers). Pioneer 6 was the first satellite to orbit the Sun, launched on December 16, 1965. The other planets were first flown by in 1965 for Mars by Mariner 4, 1973 for Jupiter by "Pioneer 10", 1974 for Mercury by Mariner 10, 1979 for Saturn by "Pioneer 11", 1986 for Uranus by "Voyager 2", 1989 for Neptune by "Voyager 2". In 2015, the dwarf planets Ceres and Pluto were orbited by "Dawn" and passed by "New Horizons", respectively.
Space exploration | First astronomical body space explorations
The first successful probe to fly by another Solar System body was "Luna 1", which sped past the Moon in 1959. Originally meant to impact with the Moon, it instead missed its target and became the first artificial object to orbit the Sun. "Mariner 2" was the first planetary flyby, passing Venus in 1962. The first successful flyby of Mars was made by "Mariner 4" in 1965. "Mariner 10" first passed Mercury in 1974. The first probe to explore the outer planets was "Pioneer 10", which flew by Jupiter in 1973. "Pioneer 11" was the first to visit Saturn, in 1979.
Discovery and exploration of the Solar System | Flybys
The final mission in the series, Mariner 10, flew past Venus before going on to encounter Mercury, after which it returned to Mercury for a total of three flybys. The next-to-last, Mariner 9, became the first ever to orbit another planet when it reached Mars for about a year of mapping and measurement. The Mariners were all relatively small robotic explorers, each launched on an Atlas rocket with either an Agena or Centaur upper-stage booster, and weighing less than half a ton (without onboard rocket propellant). Each of their missions was completed within a few months to a year or two, though one of them outlived its original mission and continued to send useful scientific data for three years.
Mariner program | Introduction
The Deep Space 2 impactor probe was to be the first spacecraft to penetrate below the surface of another planet. However, the mission failed with the loss of its mother ship, "Mars Polar Lander", which lost communication with Earth during entry into Mars' atmosphere on 3 December 1999.
Lander (spacecraft) | Deep Space 2
Mariner 10 was an American robotic space probe launched by NASA on 3 November 1973, to fly by the planets Mercury and Venus. It was the first spacecraft to perform flybys of multiple planets. "Mariner 10" was launched approximately two years after "Mariner 9" and was the last spacecraft in the Mariner program. (Mariner 11 and Mariner 12 were allocated to the Voyager program and redesignated "Voyager 1" and "Voyager 2".) The mission objectives were to measure Mercury's environment, atmosphere, surface, and body characteristics and to make similar investigations of Venus. Secondary objectives were to perform experiments in the interplanetary medium and to obtain experience with a dual-planet gravity assist mission.
Mariner 10 | Introduction
Mariner 3 (together with Mariner 4 known as Mariner-Mars 1964) was one of two identical deep-space probes designed and built by the Jet Propulsion Laboratory (JPL) for NASA's Mariner-Mars 1964 project that were intended to conduct close-up (flyby) scientific observations of the planet Mars and transmit information on interplanetary space and the space surrounding Mars, televised images of the Martian surface and radio occultation data of spacecraft signals as affected by the Martian atmosphere back to Earth. Although the launch was initially successful, there was a separation issue and Mariner 3 stopped responding when its batteries ran out of power.
Mariner 3 | Introduction
This is the only landing accomplished in the outer Solar System. It was also the first landing on a moon other than Earth's Moon. "Huygens" touched down on land, although the possibility that it would touch down in an ocean was also taken into account in its design. The probe was designed to gather data for a few hours in the atmosphere, and possibly a short time at the surface. It continued to send data for about 90 minutes after touchdown.
Huygens (spacecraft) | Introduction
The probe's mission was accomplished by Mariner 2, which launched 5 weeks later.
Mariner 1 | Introduction
First soft landing on Mars (December 2, 1971) The lander began transmitting to the Mars 3 orbiter 90 seconds after landing. After 20 seconds, transmission stopped for unknown reasons.
Space probe | <a href="Mars%203">Mars 3</a>
The total data returned by the mission was 5.2 million bits (about 634 kB). All instruments operated successfully with the exception of a part of the ionization chamber, namely the Geiger–Müller tube, which failed in February 1965. In addition, the plasma probe had its performance degraded by a resistor failure on December 8, 1964, but experimenters were able to recalibrate the instrument and still interpret the data. The images returned showed a Moon-like cratered terrain, which scientists did not expect, although amateur astronomer Donald Cyr had predicted craters. Later missions showed that the craters were not typical for Mars, but only for the more ancient region imaged by Mariner 4.
Mariner 4 | Results
The Mariner program conducted by NASA launched a series of robotic interplanetary probes designed to investigate Mars, Venus and Mercury. The program included a number of firsts, including the first planetary flyby, the first pictures from another planet, the first planetary orbiter, and the first interplanetary gravity assist maneuver. Of the ten vehicles in the Mariner series, seven were successful, and three were lost. The planned Mariner 11 and Mariner 12 vehicles evolved into Voyager 1 and Voyager 2, while the Viking 1 and Viking 2 Mars orbiters were enlarged versions of the Mariner 9 spacecraft. Other Mariner-based spacecraft included the Magellan probe to Venus and the Galileo probe to Jupiter.
List of uncrewed NASA missions | Mariner program (1962–1973)
The Venera 3 to 6 probes were similar. Weighing approximately one ton, and launched by the Molniya-type booster rocket, they included a cruise "bus" and a spherical atmospheric entry probe. The probes were optimised for atmospheric measurements, but not equipped with any special landing apparatus. Although it was hoped they would reach the surface still functioning, the first probes failed almost immediately, thereby disabling data transmission to Earth. Venera 3 became the first human-made object to impact another planet's surface as it crash-landed on March 1, 1966. However, as the spacecraft's data probes had failed upon atmospheric penetration, no data from within the Venusian boundary were retrieved from the mission.
Venera | Venera 3 to 6
Mariner 6 and Mariner 7 (Mariner Mars 69A and Mariner Mars 69B) were two unmanned NASA space probes that completed the first dual mission to Mars in 1969 as part of NASA's wider Mariner program. Mariner 6 was launched from Launch Complex 36B at Cape Canaveral Air Force Station and Mariner 7 from Launch Complex 36A at Cape Kennedy. The craft flew over the equator and south polar regions, analyzing the atmosphere and the surface with remote sensors, and recording and relaying hundreds of pictures. The mission's goals were to study the surface and atmosphere of Mars during close flybys, in order to establish the basis for future investigations, particularly those relevant to the search for extraterrestrial life, and to demonstrate and develop technologies required for future Mars missions.
Mariner 6 and 7 | Introduction
The Venera 7 probe was the first spacecraft to successfully soft land on another planet (Venus) and to transmit data from there back to Earth.
Space probe | Venus 7
First spacecraft to visit and orbit a protoplanet (4 Vesta), entering orbit on July 16, 2011. Entered orbit around dwarf planet Ceres in early 2015. Currently orbiting Ceres as of February 2017.
Space probe | "<a href="Dawn%20%28spacecraft%29">Dawn</a>"
On March 1, 1966 the "Venera 3" Soviet space probe crash-landed on Venus, becoming the first spacecraft to reach the surface of another planet. Its sister craft "Venera 2" had failed due to overheating shortly before completing its flyby mission. The descent capsule of "Venera 4" entered the atmosphere of Venus on October 18, 1967, making it the first probe to return direct measurements from another planet's atmosphere. The capsule measured temperature, pressure, density and performed 11 automatic chemical experiments to analyze the atmosphere. It discovered that the atmosphere of Venus was 95% carbon dioxide (), and in combination with radio occultation data from the "Mariner 5" probe, showed that surface pressures were far greater than expected (75 to 100 atmospheres).
Observations and explorations of Venus | Early landings
On February 12, 1961, the Soviet spacecraft "Venera 1" was the first probe launched to another planet. An overheated orientation sensor caused it to malfunction, losing contact with Earth before its closest approach to Venus of 100,000 km. However, the probe was first to combine all the necessary features of an interplanetary spacecraft: solar panels, parabolic telemetry antenna, 3-axis stabilization, course-correction engine, and the first launch from parking orbit. The first successful Venus probe was the American "Mariner 2" spacecraft, which flew past Venus in 1962, coming within 35,000 km. A modified "Ranger" Moon probe, it established that Venus has practically no intrinsic magnetic field and measured the temperature of the planet's atmosphere to be approximately .
Observations and explorations of Venus | Early flybys
While entering the atmosphere it became the first spacecraft to survive entry into another planet's atmosphere. The station detected a weak magnetic field and no radiation field. The outer atmospheric layer contained very little hydrogen and no atomic oxygen. The probe sent the first direct measurements proving that Venus was extremely hot, that its atmosphere was far denser than expected, and that it had lost most of its water long ago.
Venera 4 | Introduction
The Mariner 10 probe was the first spacecraft to use the gravitational slingshot effect to reach another planet, passing by Venus on 5 February 1974 on its way to becoming the first spacecraft to explore Mercury.
Gravity assist | "Mariner 10"
On 18 October 1967, Venera 4 became the first spacecraft to measure the atmosphere of another planet. While the Soviet Union initially claimed the craft reached the surface intact, re-analysis including atmospheric occultation data from the American Mariner 5 spacecraft that flew by Venus the day after its arrival demonstrated that Venus's surface pressure was 75-100 atmospheres, much higher than Venera 4's 25 atm hull strength, and the claim was retracted.
Venera | Venera 3 to 6
Mariner 3 and Mariner 4 used a redesigned spacecraft bus weighing , and were launched on November 5 and November 28, 1964 to fly by the planet Mars. Mariner 3 failed after a successful launch when its payload shroud failed to open. These Mariners carried cameras, and Mariner 4 successfully returned pictures of Mars as it flew by. The Mariner 5 was successfully launched to Venus on June 14, 1967 and flew by in October, probing Venus' atmosphere with radio waves, scanning its brightness in ultraviolet light, and sampling solar particles and magnetic field fluctuations above the planet.
Atlas-Agena | Mariner
In 1966, the Moon became the first Solar System body beyond Earth to be orbited by an artificial satellite ("Luna 10"), followed by Mars in 1971 ("Mariner 9"), Venus in 1975 ("Venera 9"), Jupiter in 1995 ("Galileo"), the asteroid 433 Eros in 2000 ("NEAR Shoemaker"), Saturn in 2004 ("Cassini–Huygens"), and Mercury and Vesta in 2011 ("MESSENGER" and "Dawn" respectively). "Dawn" is orbiting the asteroid–dwarf planet Ceres as of 2015. The first probe to land on another Solar System body was the Soviet "Luna 2" probe, which impacted the Moon in 1959. Since then, increasingly distant planets have been reached, with probes landing on or impacting the surfaces of Venus in 1966 ("Venera 3"), Mars in 1971 ("Mars 3", although a fully successful landing didn't occur until "Viking 1" in 1976), the asteroid 433 Eros in 2001 ("NEAR Shoemaker"), and Saturn's moon Titan ("Huygens") and the comet Tempel 1 ("Deep Impact") in 2005.
Discovery and exploration of the Solar System | Orbiters, rovers and landers
Two Russian/French spacecraft, "Vega 1" and "Vega 2", dropped landers and balloons (first weather balloons deployed on another planet) at Venus before their rendezvous with Halley's Comet.
Space probe | <a href="Vega%20program">Vega</a>
Mariner 2 was the first spacecraft to successfully encounter another planet, passing as close as to Venus after 110 days of flight on December 14, 1962.
Mariner 2 | Encounter with Venus
The probe New Horizons encountered the Kuiper belt object 486958 Arrokoth on 1 January. This is the farthest object from the Sun ever to have a close encounter with a spacecraft. The Japanese asteroid exploration mission Hayabusa2 made a second touchdown with 162173 Ryugu to collect samples, and departed for Earth on 12 November. NASA declared the Mars rover "Opportunity"'s mission over on 13 February. The InSight lander observed the first recorded Marsquake in April.
2019 in spaceflight | Exploration of the Solar System
The Mariner spacecraft were built by NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory. Mariner 1 and Mariner 2 were twins, launched on July 22 and August 27, 1962, to fly by the planet Venus. The first two craft used the same spacecraft bus as the Block I Rangers, each weighing and instrumented to perform radiometric temperature measurements of the planet, and to measure interplanetary magnetic fields and particles. Mariner 1's Atlas-Agena malfunctioned and went off course, requiring its destruction approximately 5 minutes after liftoff. Mariner 2 successfully made the 3½-month flight, becoming the first spacecraft to fly by another planet. It carried microwave and infrared radiometers, and sensors for cosmic dust, solar plasma and high-energy radiation, and magnetic fields.
Atlas-Agena | Mariner
Far less instrumentation was carried than on the Soviet Venera probes of this period—for example, forgoing a TV camera—as the Atlas-Agena B had only half as much lift capacity as the Soviet 8K78 booster. The Mariner 2 spacecraft was launched from Cape Canaveral on August 27, 1962, and passed as close as to Venus on December 14, 1962. The Mariner probe consisted of a 100 cm (39.4 in) diameter hexagonal bus, to which solar panels, instrument booms, and antennas were attached. The scientific instruments on board the Mariner spacecraft were: two radiometers (one each for the microwave and infrared portions of the spectrum), a micrometeorite sensor, a solar plasma sensor, a charged particle sensor, and a magnetometer.
Mariner 2 | Introduction
The mission of this spacecraft was to land on the Venusian surface. The entry body contained a radio communication system, scientific instruments, electrical power sources, and medallions bearing the Coat of Arms of the Soviet Union. The probe was sterilised before launch. The probe's initial trajectory missed Venus by 60,550km and a course correction manoeuvre was carried out on 26 December 1965 which brought the probe onto a collision course with the planet. Contact with the probe was lost on 15 February 1966 probably due to overheating. The entry probe crashed on Venus on 1 March 1966, making Venera 3 the first space probe to hit the surface of another planet.
Venera 3 | Mission
The spacecraft passed Venus on 5 February 1974, the closest approach being at 17:01 UTC. It was the twelfth spacecraft to reach Venus and the eighth to return data from the planet, as well as the first mission to succeed in broadcasting images of Venus back to Earth. "Mariner 10" built upon observations made by "Mariner 5" six years earlier; importantly, "Mariner 10" had a camera whereas the prior mission lacked one. As "Mariner 10" veered around Venus, from the planet's night side to daylight, the cameras snapped the probe's first image of Venus, showing an illuminated arc of clouds over the north pole emerging from darkness.
Mariner 10 | Venus flyby
Further communication attempts were tried, in a joint spacecraft solar wind / solar magnetic fields investigation with Mariner 4, back in communication with Earth after being out of telemetry for about a year or more around superior conjunction. During the experiment, both spacecraft were going to be on the same idealized magnetic field spiral carried out from the sun by the solar wind. Between April and November 1968 NASA tried to reacquire Mariner 5 to continue probing interplanetary conditions. Attempts to reacquire Mariner 5 during June, July, and early August 1968 yielded no spacecraft signal. On October 14, the receiver operator at DSS 14 obtained a lock on the Mariner 5 signal.
Mariner 5 | Further communication attempts
Mariner 9 was the first spacecraft to orbit another planet. It carried an instrument payload similar to Mariners 6 and 7, but because of the need for a larger propulsion system to control the spacecraft in Martian orbit, it weighed more than Mariners 6 and 7 combined. When Mariner 9 arrived at Mars on November 14, 1971, planetary scientists were surprised to find the atmosphere was thick with "a planet-wide robe of dust, the largest storm ever observed." The surface was totally obscured. Mariner 9's computer was thus reprogrammed from Earth to delay imaging of the surface for a couple of months until the dust settled.
Mariner 9 | Achievements
In 1976 two American "Viking" probes entered orbit about Mars and each released a lander module that made a successful soft landing on the planet's surface. They subsequently had the first successful transmission of large volumes of data, including the first color pictures and extensive scientific information. Measured temperatures at the landing sites ranged from , with a variation over a given day of . Seasonal dust storms, pressure changes, and movement of atmospheric gases between the polar caps were observed. A biology experiment produced possible evidence of life, but it was not corroborated by other on-board experiments. While searching for a suitable landing spot for "Viking 2"s lander, the "Viking 1" orbiter photographed the landform that constitutes the so-called "Face on Mars" on 25 July 1976.
Mars landing | Viking program
First successful rover on Mars.
Space probe | "<a href="Sojourner%20%28rover%29">Sojourner</a>"
It provided radically more accurate data about the planet; a surface atmospheric pressure of about 1% of Earth's and daytime temperatures of −100 °C (−148 °F) were estimated. No magnetic field or Martian radiation belts were detected. The new data meant redesigns for then planned Martian landers, and showed life would have a more difficult time surviving there than previously anticipated. NASA continued the Mariner program with another pair of Mars flyby probes, Mariner 6 and 7. They were sent at the next launch window, and reached the planet in 1969. During the following launch window the Mariner program again suffered the loss of one of a pair of probes.
Exploration of Mars | Mariner program
The Soviet Union's Mars 1962B became the first Earth-based mission intended to impact on Mars in 1962. In 1971, the lander of the Mars 3 probe conducted the first soft landing on Mars, but communication was lost within a minute after touchdown, which occurred during one of the worst global dust storms since the beginning of telescopic observations of the Red Planet. Three other landers, Mars 2 in 1971 and Mars 5 and Mars 6 in 1973, either crashed or failed to even enter the planet's atmosphere. All four landers used an aeroshell-like heat shield during atmospheric entry. Mars 2 and Mars 3 landers carried the first small skis-walking Mars rovers that did not work on the planet.
Lander (spacecraft) | Mars
In addition, several planetary probes have sent back observations of the Earth-Moon system shortly after launch, most notably "Mariner 10", Pioneers 10 and 11 and both Voyager probes ("Voyager 1" and "Voyager 2").
List of Solar System probes | <a href="Earth">Earth</a> flybys
This required the use of a Saturn V to launch two probes at once. The orbiter would have been a modified Mariner probe identical to that employed for Mariner 8 and Mariner 9, while the landers would have been Surveyor moon probes modified with the use of aeroshells and a combination parachute/retrorocket landing systems. Funding for the program, like that of the entire AAP, was cut in 1968 and the mission itself was cancelled entirely in 1971, mainly on the grounds that launching both probes on a single rocket was both risky and expensive. Voyager was the first major space science project to be cancelled by the U.S.
Voyager program (Mars) | Introduction
By chance, both spacecrafts flew over cratered regions and missed both the giant northern volcanoes and the equatorial grand canyon discovered later. Their approach pictures did, however, photograph about 20 percent of the planet's surface, showing the dark features long seen from Earth – in the past, these features had been mistaken for canals by some ground-based astronomers. When Mariner 7 flew over the martian south pole on August 4, 1969, it sent back pictures of ice-filled craters and outlines of the south polar cap. Despite the communication defect suffered by Mariner 7 earlier, these pictures were of better quality than what had been sent by its twin, Mariner 6, a few days earlier when it flew past the martian equator.
Mariner 6 and 7 | Science data and findings
First probe to fly by Saturn. (Communications were later lost due to power constraints and vast distance.)
Space probe | "<a href="Pioneer%2011">Pioneer 11</a>"
Two nominally identical 4V-1 probes were launched in June 1967. The first probe, Venera 4, was launched on 12 June by a Molniya-M carrier rocket flying from the Baikonur Cosmodrome. A course correction was performed on 29 July when it was 12 million km away from Earth; otherwise, the probe would have missed Venus. Although two such corrections had been planned, the first one was accurate enough and therefore the second correction was canceled. On 18 October 1967, the spacecraft entered the Venusian atmosphere with an estimated landing place near . The second probe, Kosmos 167, was launched on 17 June but failed to depart low Earth orbit.
Venera 4 | Mission
Ranger 5 was scheduled for launch in June 1962, but NASA instead decided to fly the Mariner Venus probes (basically modified Block I Rangers) first which gave more time to work out problems with the spacecraft. After Mariner 1 ended its mission in the Atlantic Ocean instead of interplanetary space, the agency started coming under increased scrutiny from Congress due to its apparent inability to have any kind of success with planetary probes. Republican Congressman James Fulton confronted NASA Director of the Office of Programs J.J. Wyatt, noting that Mariner 1 had cost U.S. taxpayers $14 million and that there was no excuse at this point for failures every launch.
Ranger 5 | Mission
space probes have landed on all three bodies other than Earth that have solid surfaces and atmospheres thick enough to make aerobraking possible: Mars, Venus, and Saturn's moon Titan. These probes were able to leverage the atmospheres of the bodies on which they landed to slow their descent using parachutes, reducing the amount of fuel they were required to carry. This in turn allowed larger payloads to be landed on these bodies for a given amount of fuel. For example, the 900-kg "Curiosity" rover was landed on Mars by a craft having a mass (at the time of Mars atmospheric entry) of 2400 kg, of which only 390 kg was fuel.
Lunar lander | Lack of atmosphere
Mariner 9 successfully entered orbit about Mars, the first spacecraft ever to do so, after the launch time failure of its sister ship, Mariner 8. When Mariner 9 reached Mars in 1971, it and two Soviet orbiters (Mars 2 and Mars 3, see "Mars probe program" above) found that a planet-wide dust storm was in progress. The mission controllers used the time spent waiting for the storm to clear to have the probe rendezvous with, and photograph, Phobos. When the storm cleared sufficiently for Mars' surface to be photographed by Mariner 9, the pictures returned represented a substantial advance over previous missions.
Exploration of Mars | Mariner program
First sample return probe to launch from an asteroid.
Space probe | "<a href="Hayabusa">Hayabusa</a>"
The Mariner program was a 10-mission program conducted by the American space agency NASA in conjunction with Jet Propulsion Laboratory (JPL). The program launched a series of robotic interplanetary probes, from 1962 to 1973, designed to investigate Mars, Venus and Mercury. The program included a number of firsts, including the first planetary flyby, the first planetary orbiter, and the first gravity assist maneuver. Between 1962 and late 1973, NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory designed and built 10 spacecraft named Mariner to explore the inner solar system - visiting the planets Venus, Mars and Mercury for the first time, and returning to Venus and Mars for additional close observations.
Mariner program | Introduction
Others concluded that a search for life on Earth at kilometer resolution, using several thousand photographs, did not reveal a sign of life on the vast majority of these photographs; thus, based on the 22 photographs taken by Mariner 4, one could not conclude there was no intelligent life on Mars. The solar wind was measured, and compared with simultaneous records from Mariner 5 which went to Venus.
Mariner 4 | Results
On January 5, 1965, 36 days after launch and 10,261,173 km from Earth, Mariner 4 reduced its rate of transmission of scientific data from 33 1/3 to 8 1/2 bits per second. This was the first autonomous action the spacecraft had taken since the midcourse maneuver.
Mariner 4 | Data transmission rate reduced
Mars 6 failed during descent but did return some corrupted atmospheric data in 1974. The 1975 NASA launches of the Viking program consisted of two orbiters, each with a lander that successfully soft landed in 1976. "Viking 1" remained operational for six years, "Viking 2" for three. The Viking landers relayed the first color panoramas of Mars. The Soviet probes Phobos 1 and 2 were sent to Mars in 1988 to study Mars and its two moons, with a focus on Phobos. Phobos 1 lost contact on the way to Mars. Phobos 2, while successfully photographing Mars and Phobos, failed before it was set to release two landers to the surface of Phobos.
Exploration of Mars | Past and current missions
The second-generation Mariner spacecraft, called the Mariner Mark II series, eventually evolved into the Cassini–Huygens probe, which spent more than 13 years in orbit around Saturn. All Mariner spacecraft were based on a hexagonal or octagonal "bus," which housed all of the electronics, and to which all components were attached, such as antennae, cameras, propulsion, and power sources. All probes except Mariner 1, Mariner 2 and Mariner 5 had TV cameras. The first five Mariners were launched on Atlas-Agena rockets, while the last five used the Atlas-Centaur.
List of uncrewed NASA missions | Mariner program (1962–1973)
In 1973, Mariner 10 was launched by NASA to make multiple flyby encounters of Venus and Mercury. Mariner 10 provided the first detailed data of Mercury, mapping 40–45% of the surface. Mariner 10's final flyby of Mercury occurred on March 16, 1975. No subsequent close-range observations of the planet would take place for more than 30 years.
MESSENGER | Previous missions
NEAR Shoemaker was the first to soft land on an asteroid – 433 Eros in February 2001 while Hayabusa was the first to return samples from 25143 Itokawa on 13 June 2010. Huygens soft landed and returned data from Titan on January 14, 2005. There have been many failed attempts, more recently Fobos-Grunt, a sample return mission aimed at exploring the surface of Phobos.
Planetary surface | Past missions
The Mariner 4 spacecraft flew by Mars on July 14 and 15, 1965. Its closest approach was 9,846 km from the Martian surface at 01:00:57 UT July 15, 1965 (8:00:57 p.m. EST July 14), its distance to Earth was 216 million km, its speed was 7 km/s relative to Mars, 1.7 km/s relative to Earth. Planetary science mode was turned on at 15:41:49 UT on July 14. The camera sequence started at 00:18:36 UT on July 15 (7:18:49 p.m. EST on July 14) and 21 pictures using alternate red and green filters, plus 21 lines of a 22nd picture were taken.
Mariner 4 | Mars flyby
The first extraterrestrial planetary surface to be explored was the lunar surface by Luna 2 in 1959. The first and only human exploration of an extraterrestrial surface was the Moon, the Apollo program included the first moonwalk on July 20, 1969 and successful return of extraterrestrial surface samples to Earth. Venera 7 was the first landing of a probe on another planet on December 15, 1970. Mars 3 "soft landed" and returned data from Mars on August 22, 1972, the first rover on Mars was Mars Pathfinder in 1997, the Mars Exploration Rover has been studying the surface of the red planet since 2004.
Planetary surface | Past missions
Three Mariner probes were constructed for the mission, with two intended to fly and one as a spare in the event of a mission failure. The spacecraft was shipped to Cape Canaveral with their Atlas-Centaur boosters in December 1968 – January 1969 to begin pre-launch checkouts and testing. On February 14, Mariner 6 was undergoing a simulated countdown on LC-36A, electrical power running, but no propellant loaded in the booster. During the test run, an electrical relay in the Atlas malfunctioned and opened two valves in the pneumatic system which allowed helium pressure gas to escape from the booster's balloon skin.
Mariner 6 and 7 | Launch
First man-made object to soft land on the Moon, or any other extra terrestrial surface.
Space probe | <a href="Luna%209">Luna 9</a>
Deep Space 2 was a NASA probe part of the New Millennium Program. It included two highly advanced miniature space probes that were sent to Mars aboard the Mars Polar Lander in January 1999. The probes were named "Scott" and "Amundsen", in honor of Robert Falcon Scott and Roald Amundsen, the first explorers to reach the Earth's South Pole. Intended to be the first spacecraft to penetrate below the surface of another planet, after entering the Mars atmosphere DS2 was to detach from the Mars Polar Lander mother ship and plummet to the surface using only an aeroshell impactor, with no parachute.
Deep Space 2 | Introduction
The Soviet Union planned the heavy Marsokhod Mars 4NM mission in 1973 and the Mars sample return Mars 5NM mission in 1975, but neither occurred due to needing the N1 super-launcher that was never flown successfully. A double-launching Soviet Mars 5M (Mars-79) sample return mission was planned for 1979 but cancelled due to complexity and technical problems. "Viking 1" and "Viking 2" were launched respectively in August and September 1975, each comprising an orbiter vehicle and a lander. "Viking 1" landed in July 1976 and "Viking 2" in September 1976. The Viking program rovers were the first successful, functioning Mars landers.
Lander (spacecraft) | Mars
All images were transmitted twice to ensure no data was missing or corrupt. Each individual photograph took approximately six hours to be transmitted back to Earth. The spacecraft performed all programmed activities successfully and returned useful data from launch until 22:05:07 UT on October 1, 1965, when the long distance to Earth (309.2 million km) and the imprecise antenna orientation led to a temporary loss of communication with the spacecraft until 1967.
Mariner 4 | Mars flyby
Mariner Jupiter-Saturn was approved in 1972 after the cancellation of the Grand Tour program, which proposed visiting all the outer planets with multiple spacecraft. The Mariner Jupiter-Saturn program proposed two Mariner-derived probes that would perform a scaled back mission involving flybys of only the two gas giants, though designers at JPL built the craft with the intention that further encounters past Saturn would be an option. Trajectories were chosen to allow one probe to visit Jupiter and Saturn first, and perform a flyby of Saturn's moon Titan to gather information about the moon's substantial atmosphere. The other probe would arrive at Jupiter and Saturn later, and its trajectory would enable it to continue on to Uranus and Neptune assuming the first probe accomplished all its objectives, or be redirected to perform a Titan flyby if necessary.
Mariner program | Mariner Jupiter-Saturn
This Japanese probe was the first non-US, non-Soviet interplanetary probe.
Space probe | "<a href="Sakigake">Sakigake</a>"
The first probe intended to be a Mars impact lander was the Soviet "Mars 1962B", unsuccessfully launched in 1962. In 1970 Soviet Union began the design of "Mars 4NM" and "Mars 5NM" missions with super-heavy uncrewed Martian spacecraft. First was "Marsokhod", with a planned date of early 1973, and second was the Mars sample return mission planned for 1975. Both spacecraft were intended to be launched on the "N1" rocket, but this rocket never flew successfully and the Mars 4NM and Mars 5NM projects were cancelled. In 1971 the Soviet Union sent probes "Mars 2" and "Mars 3", each carrying a lander, as part of the Mars probe program M-71.
Mars landing | Mars probe program
The spacecraft carried one large and three small atmospheric probes, designed to collect data as they descended into the atmosphere of Venus. The probes did not carry photographic instruments, and were not designed to survive landing – the smaller probes were not equipped with parachutes, and the larger probe's parachute was expected to detach as it neared the ground. All four probes continued transmitting data until impact; however, one survived and continued to transmit data from the surface.
Pioneer Venus Multiprobe | Probes
Mariner Mark II class spacecraft developed for NASA by JPL were a new design approach advocated by NASA's Solar System Exploration Committee and were intended for flights in the 1990s to the outer planets and primitive bodies, such as comets and asteroids. CRAF was to be the first Mariner Mark II mission. The second mission, called Saturn Orbiter Titan Probe or SOTP (later Cassini–Huygens), was a Saturn orbiter with a probe designed to plunge into the atmosphere of the ringed planet's largest satellite, Titan. CRAF and SOTP were to use identical Mariner Mark II spacecraft, but each was to carry unique science instruments.
Comet Rendezvous Asteroid Flyby | Spacecraft design
This is the first planet discovered by the then-new HARPS spectrograph.
HD 330075 | Introduction
The two Viking landers each carried four types of biological experiments to the surface of Mars in 1976. These were the first Mars landers to carry out experiments to look for biosignatures of microbial life on Mars. The landers used a robotic arm to put soil samples into sealed test containers on the craft. The two landers were identical, so the same tests were carried out at two places on Mars' surface, Viking 1 near the equator and Viking 2 further north.
Viking lander biological experiments | Introduction
American interplanetary probes continued in the 1980s, the Voyager duo being the most known. After making a flyby of Jupiter in 1979, they went near Saturn in 1980–1981. Voyager 2 reached Uranus in 1986 (just a few days before the "Challenger" disaster), and Neptune in 1989 before the probes exited the solar system. No American probes were launched to Mars in the 1980s, and the Viking probes, launched there in 1975, completed their operations by 1982. The Soviets launched two Mars probes in 1988, but they failed. The arrival of Halley's Comet in 1986 was met by a series of Soviet, Japanese and European Space Agency (ESA) probes, namely Halley Armada.
1980s | Space exploration
Engineered to explore the orbits of Venus and Mercury, "Mariner 10" launched in November 1973. The mission's two- year plan used the gravitational pull of Venus to reach Mercury. The probe also used solar winds to help with locomotion when fuel ran low. "Mariner 10" orbited the planets in the opposite direction of Earth's orbit. Mariner's first photographed images, which revealed Venus's dense cloud cover, reached NASA scientists in February 1974. Data collected by "Mariner 10" helped determine Venus's rotation period and use of Earth's magnetic field. Photos of Mercury revealed its cratered surface and its large scarps and plains.
U.S. space exploration history on U.S. stamps | "Mariner 10" Issue of 1975
The Mariner 5 spacecraft was launched to Venus on June 14, 1967 and arrived in the vicinity of the planet in October 1967. It carried a complement of experiments to probe Venus' atmosphere with radio waves, scan its brightness in ultraviolet light, and sample the solar particles and magnetic field fluctuations above the planet. Status: Mariner 5 – Defunct. Now in heliocentric orbit.
Mariner program | Mariner 5
Remotely guided space probes have flown by all of the planets of the Solar System from Mercury to Neptune, with the "New Horizons" probe having flown by the dwarf planet Pluto and the "Dawn" spacecraft currently orbiting the dwarf planet Ceres. The most distant spacecraft, "Voyager 1" and "Voyager 2" have left the Solar System as of while "Pioneer 10", "Pioneer 11", and "New Horizons" are on course to leave it. In general, planetary orbiters and landers return much more detailed and comprehensive information than fly-by missions. Space probes have been placed into orbit around all the five planets known to the ancients: The first being Venus (Venera 7, 1970), Jupiter ("Galileo", 1995), Saturn ("Cassini/Huygens", 2004), and most recently Mercury ("MESSENGER", March 2011), and have returned data about these bodies and their natural satellites.
Interplanetary spaceflight | Current achievements in interplanetary travel
The Mars 2 lander failed to land and impacted Mars. The Mars 3 lander became the first probe to successfully soft-land on Mars, but its data-gathering had less success. The lander began transmitting to the Mars 3 orbiter 90 seconds after landing, but after 14.5 seconds, transmission ceased for unknown reasons. The cause of the failure may have been related to the extremely powerful Martian dust storm taking place at the time. These space probes each contained a Mars rover although they were never deployed.
Mars landing | Mars probe program
The first robotic space probe mission to Venus, and the first to any planet, began with the Soviet Venera program in 1961. Venus was the target of numerous Soviet missions between 1967 and 1984 and for this reason has been described by Russian officials as a "Russian planet". The United States' exploration of Venus had its first success with the Mariner 2 mission on 14 December 1962, becoming the world's first successful interplanetary mission, passing above the surface of Venus, and gathering data on the planet's atmosphere. On 18 October 1967, the Soviet "Venera 4" successfully entered the atmosphere and deployed science experiments.
Venus | Exploration
The Venera (, , which means "Venus" in Russian) program was the name given to a series of space probes developed by the Soviet Union between 1961 and 1984 to gather information about the planet Venus. Ten probes successfully landed on the surface of the planet, including the two Vega program and Venera-Halley probes, while thirteen probes successfully entered the Venusian atmosphere. Due to the extreme surface conditions on Venus, the probes could only survive for a short period on the surface, with times ranging from 23 minutes to two hours. The "Venera" program established a number of precedents in space exploration, among them being the first human-made devices to enter the atmosphere of another planet (Venera 3 on March 1, 1966), the first to make a soft landing on another planet (Venera 7 on December 15, 1970), the first to return images from another planet's surface (Venera 9 on June 8, 1975), and the first to perform high-resolution radar mapping scans (Venera 15 on June 2, 1983).
Venera | Introduction
The probe was launched from Earth on 17 August 1970, at 05:38 UTC. It consisted of an interplanetary bus, based on the 3MV system, and a lander. During the flight to Venus, two in-course corrections were made using the bus' on-board KDU-414 engine.
Venera 7 | Launch
Probe Balboa, named after Vasco Núñez de Balboa, was the first probe launched to explore Darwin IV. However, it experienced a malfunction while the two small wings/fins were unfolding. When it entered Darwin IV's atmosphere, non-heat-resistant material that was exposed caught fire, leading to the breakup of the craft. If Probe Balboa's entry into Darwin IV atmosphere is watched carefully, it can be seen that the right wing/fin does not extend and lock into place. Probe Balboa was never given a nickname. It was the shortest lasting probe, since it was never activated. Its color is red.
Alien Planet | Probe Balboa
It was then determined that an error had prevented two of the spacecraft's four solar panels from deploying, blocking the spacecraft's communications. Beagle 2 was the first British and first European probe to achieve a landing on Mars.
Mars Express | Lander
That is not a problem for missions which land via an airbag-protected capsule, slowed by parachutes and retrorockets, and dropped from a height that allows rocket exhaust to avoid the surface. Mars Pathfinder's "Sojourner" rover and the Mars Exploration Rovers each used this landing technique successfully. The Phoenix Scout lander descended to the surface with retro-rockets, however, their fuel was hydrazine, and the end products of the plume (water, nitrogen, and ammonia) were not found to have affected the soils at the landing site.
Viking lander biological experiments | Critiques
The first successful planetary mission was the 1962 fly-by of Venus by Mariner 2. The first fly-by of Mars was by Mariner 4 in 1964. Since that time, uncrewed spacecraft have successfully examined each of the Solar System's planets, as well their moons and many minor planets and comets. They remain a fundamental tool for the exploration of outer space, as well as for observation of the Earth. In August 2012, "Voyager 1" became the first man-made object to leave the Solar System and enter interstellar space. The absence of air makes outer space an ideal location for astronomy at all wavelengths of the electromagnetic spectrum.
Outer space | Exploration and application
Numerous scientific exploration missions were begun in 2011. In March 2011, the "MESSENGER" probe became the first artificial satellite of the planet Mercury. In July, the "Dawn" spacecraft became the first artificial satellite of the asteroid 4 Vesta. The Mars Science Laboratory – at the time, the largest Mars rover ever constructed – was launched in November, conducting a successful landing on Mars in August 2012.
2011 in spaceflight | Robotic exploration
Using the plasma detectors, Mariner 10 gathered the first "in situ" solar wind data from inside Venus' orbit. Shortly after launch, scientists found that the Scanning Electrostatic Analyzer had failed because a door shielding the analyzer did not open. An unsuccessful attempt was made to forcibly unfasten the door with the first course correction maneuver. The experiment operators had planned to observe the directions taken by positive ions prior to the ions' collision with the Analyzer, but this data was lost. The experiment was still able to collect some data using the properly functioning Scanning Electron Spectrometer.
Mariner 10 | Plasma detectors
, originally known as Planet-A, was an unmanned space probe developed by the Institute of Space and Astronautical Science (now part of the Japanese Aerospace Exploration Agency, or JAXA). It constituted a part of the Halley Armada together with "Sakigake", the Soviet/French Vega probes, the ESA "Giotto" and the NASA International Cometary Explorer, to explore Halley's Comet during its 1986 sojourn through the inner solar system.
Suisei (spacecraft) | Introduction
This was the first observation made of Mercury at close range. After the encounter "Mariner 10" was in an orbit around the Sun such that for every one of its orbits Mercury made two, and the spacecraft and the planet would be able to meet again. This allowed the probe to pass by Mercury two additional times before completing the mission; these encounters were made on September 21, 1974, and March 16, 1975. However, since the same side of Mercury was illuminated during each of the flybys, at the conclusion of the mission "Mariner 10" had only photographed 45% of its surface.
Exploration of Mercury | "Mariner 10"
The Mariner 10 spacecraft launched on November 3, 1973 and was the first to use a gravity assist trajectory, accelerating as it entered the gravitational influence of Venus, then being flung by the planet's gravity onto a slightly different course to reach Mercury. It was also the first spacecraft to encounter two planets at close range, and for 33 years the only spacecraft to photograph Mercury in closeup. Status: Mariner 10 – Defunct. Now in a heliocentric orbit.
Mariner program | Mariner 10
The images covered a discontinuous swath of Mars starting near 40° N, 170° E, down to about 35° S, 200° E, and then across to the terminator at 50° S, 255° E, representing about 1% of the planet's surface. The images taken during the flyby were stored in the on-board tape recorder. At 02:19:11 UT, Mariner 4 passed behind Mars as seen from Earth and the radio signal ceased. The signal was reacquired at 03:13:04 UT when the spacecraft reappeared. Cruise mode was then re-established. Transmission of the taped images to Earth began about 8.5 hours after signal reacquisition and continued until August 3.
Mariner 4 | Mars flyby
The USSR intended to have the first artificial satellite of Mars beating the planned American Mariner 8 and Mariner 9 Mars orbiters. In May 1971, one day after Mariner 8 malfunctioned at launch and failed to reach orbit, Cosmos 419 (Mars 1971C), a heavy probe of the Soviet Mars program M-71, also failed to launch. This spacecraft was designed as an orbiter only, while the next two probes of project M-71, Mars 2 and Mars 3, were multipurpose combinations of an orbiter and a lander with small skis-walking rovers that would be the first planet rovers outside the Moon. They were successfully launched in mid-May 1971 and reached Mars about seven months later.
Exploration of Mars | 1970s
First solar wind sample return probe from sun-earth L1.
Space probe | "<a href="Genesis%20%28spacecraft%29">Genesis</a>"
In 1971, Mars was at its closest to Earth since 1956 and in May of that year both the Soviet Union and the United States made new attempts to reach the Red Planet. Kosmos 419 was intended to overtake the United States probes, Mariner 8 and Mariner 9, in the aim of becoming the first Mars orbiter. As it was, Mariner 8 was lost in a launch failure two days before Kosmos 419 was launched, and Mariner 9 went on to become the first spacecraft to orbit Mars.
Kosmos 419 | Background
The majority of the probes to the other planets in our solar system have been remote control vehicles, although some of the more recent ones were partially autonomous. The sophistication of these devices has fueled greater debate on the need for manned spaceflight and exploration. The Voyager I spacecraft is the first craft of any kind to leave the solar system. The explorers Spirit and Opportunity have provided continuous data about the surface of Mars since January 3, 2004.
Remote control vehicle | Space probes
The scientific instruments included: The electric power for the instruments and the radio transmitter of Mariner 4 was supplied by 28,224 solar cells contained in the four 176 x 90 cm solar panels, which could provide 310 watts at the distance of Mars. A rechargeable 1200 W·h silver-zinc battery was also used for maneuvers and backup. Monopropellant hydrazine was used for propulsion, via a four-jet vane vector control motor, with thrust, installed on one of the sides of the octagonal structure. The space probe's attitude control was provided by 12 cold nitrogen gas jets mounted on the ends of the solar panels and three gyros.
Mariner 4 | Spacecraft and subsystems