Curiosity Mars Rover Almost Complete

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NASA’s massive ‘Curiosity’ rover is almost ready to begin the first leg of its long trek to the surface of the Red Planet. Engineers at NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory in California are nearly finished with assembling and testing all the components of the Mars Science Laboratory (MSL) mission (see photos above and below).

The MSL team plans to ship Curiosity as well as the cruise stage, descent stage and back shell to the Kennedy Space Center (KSC) in May and June. After arriving at KSC, all the pieces will be integrated together and tested during final assembly in a clean room. The rover will then be installed inside a 5 meter diameter nose cone, shipped the short distance to Cape Canaveral and then bolted atop an Atlas V rocket (photo below).

The launch window for Curiosity extends from Nov. 25 to Dec. 18, 2011. The first stage of the powerful Atlas V rocket will be augmented with four solid rocket boosters. The Atlas V has previously launched two planetary missions; the Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter (MRO) and the New Horizons mission to Pluto.

Take a long gander at the 3 meter long rover because its appearance is now very much how it will look while it’s roving along intriguing martian landscapes for at least two earth years after landing in August 2012.

The mini-Cooper sized Curiosity rover is equipped with 10 science instruments to investigate Martian soil and rock samples in far greater detail than ever before. Curiosity’s science payload weighs ten times more than any prior Mars rover mission.

The goal is to search for clues to environmental conditions favorable for microbial life and for preserving evidence about whether Martian life ever existed in the past or today. NASA is scrutinizing a list of four potential landing sites for the best chance of finding a habitable zone.