On Monday, August 6, 2012 11:52:42 AM UTC-4, Jon Danniken wrote:
On 08/06/2012 05:55 AM, Bob Engelhardt wrote:

Unbelievable! That landing was so frickin' complicated that I couldn't

believe that they would even try it. Especially so considering that

only 1/2 of the US missions to Mars have landed successfully. And no

other country's missions have.



Good job!



I stayed up past my bedtime last night to watch the landing from the

control room, and got to see the little pictures. Quite amazing that

the thing did all of that landing on it's own, down to scanning the site

with RADAR to ensure it was a suitably flat location.



That's not just a little toy we've got up there this time, either; it's

about as big as a car and loaded up with all manner of instruments. I'm

looking forward to seeing some more images and learning more about our

red neighbor.



Jon

I watched it live also. It was great that they were able to send back pictures so quickly. Not that I don't believe they did it, but it's nice to have some visual confirmation that it's working. I'm looking forward to a year's worth of great science from this machine.

And to just expand a little on what Bob said about it being so frickin' complicated: I often look with amazement at things like this and think to myself, "who the hell ever thought that would work?" A big load of congratulations is due to NASA and all involved for having the balls to even try this, and the smarts to pull it off. I, for one, am thoroughly impressed.