Viking program
Pair of NASA landers and orbiters sent to Mars in 1976 / From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
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The Viking program consisted of a pair of identical American space probes, Viking 1 and Viking 2, which landed on Mars in 1976.[1] The mission effort began in 1968 and was managed by the NASA Langley Research Center.[4] Each spacecraft was composed of two main parts: an orbiter designed to photograph the surface of Mars from orbit, and a lander designed to study the planet from the surface. The orbiters also served as communication relays for the landers once they touched down.
Artist impression of a Viking orbiter releasing a lander descent capsule | |
| Manufacturer | Jet Propulsion Laboratory / Martin Marietta |
|---|---|
| Country of origin | United States |
| Operator | NASA / JPL |
| Applications | Mars orbiter/lander |
| Specifications | |
| Launch mass | 3,527 kilograms (7,776 lb) |
| Power | Orbiters: 620 watts (solar array) Lander: 70 watts (two RTG units) |
| Regime | Areocentric |
| Design life | Orbiters: 4 years at Mars Landers: 4–6 years at Mars |
| Dimensions | |
| Production | |
| Status | Retired |
| Built | 2 |
| Launched | 2 |
| Retired | Viking 1 orbiter August 17, 1980[1] Viking 1 lander July 20, 1976[1] (landing) to November 13, 1982[1] Viking 2 orbiter July 25, 1978[1] Viking 2 lander September 3, 1976[1] (landing) to April 11, 1980[1] |
| Maiden launch | Viking 1 August 20, 1975[1][2] |
| Last launch | Viking 2 September 9, 1975[1][3] |
The Viking program grew from NASA's earlier, even more ambitious, Voyager Mars program, which was not related to the successful Voyager deep space probes of the late 1970s. Viking 1 was launched on August 20, 1975, and the second craft, Viking 2, was launched on September 9, 1975, both riding atop Titan IIIE rockets with Centaur upper stages. Viking 1 entered Mars orbit on June 19, 1976, with Viking 2 following on August 7.
After orbiting Mars for more than a month and returning images used for landing site selection, the orbiters and landers detached; the landers then entered the Martian atmosphere and soft-landed at the sites that had been chosen. The Viking 1 lander touched down on the surface of Mars on July 20, 1976, more than two weeks before Viking 2's arrival in orbit. Viking 2 then successfully soft-landed on September 3. The orbiters continued imaging and performing other scientific operations from orbit while the landers deployed instruments on the surface.
The project cost was roughly US$1 billion at the time of launch,[5][6] equivalent to about $5 billion in 2021 dollars.[7] The mission was considered successful and is credited with helping to form most of the body of knowledge about Mars through the late 1990s and early 2000s.[8][9]