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Published online 27 May 2008 | Nature | doi:10.1038/news.2008.857

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Phoenix set for three-month dig on Mars

NASA scientists hope for first taste of martian ice after soft landing for craft near Mars's north pole.

After a dramatic deceleration through Mars's thin atmosphere that ended with a gentle landing in welcoming rock-free terrain, NASA's Phoenix mission now stands ready to go to work.

"Everything just worked like a charm," says Barry Goldstein, the mission's project manager at the Jet Propulsion Lab in Pasadena, California, which ran mission control for the landing.

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  • Dear Sir, I believe there is a grammatical error in “..airbag approach that had proved successful..â€�; Shouldn’t it be: had proven??

    • 28 May, 2008
    • Posted by: Ehab Mohamed