Mariner Mars 1964, Mariners 3 and 4 to Mars: imaging plans? Options

[Phil Stooke]

I am currently working on a book about lunar exploration, but looking ahead to the next one, which will cover Mars. One question to which I think I have an answer - but I'd like to see what my fellow Mars enthusiasts think - is this:

Mariner 3 failed to leave Earth. But if it had flown successfully, what area on Mars would it have photographed?

My understanding is that there was no specific plan. The MM64 press kit, for instance, says nothing about image coverage for either Mariner 3 or Mariner 4. I believe that navigation to planetary distances was still so uncertain that the flight team could not predict at launch the sub-spacecraft point at closest approach - uncertainties included the exact time of the flyby, the distance and the point at which the spacecraft would pass through the target plane. These things would be known closer to the flyby but they weren't precisely predictable at launch, so Mariner 3 never got to the stage of having an imaging plan.

Am I right?

Phil

[Guest_BruceMoomaw_*]

You can find a brief Web reference to it: a chapter of Homer Newell's official 1979 NASA history document "Beyond the Atmosphere: The Early Years of Space Science: http://www.hq.nasa.gov/office/pao/History/SP-4211/ch10-4.htm . (There were nine early Pioneers rather than eight, though -- he forgets the Air Force's very first lunar Pioneer attempt in August 1958.)

[tasp]

You can find a brief Web reference to it: a chapter of Homer Newell's official 1979 NASA history document "Beyond the Atmosphere: The Early Years of Space Science: http://www.hq.nasa.gov/office/pao/History/SP-4211/ch10-4.htm .  (There were nine early Pioneers rather than eight, though -- he forgets the Air Force's very first lunar Pioneer attempt in August 1958.)

Amazing!

NASA certainly had the 'vision thing' right out of the starting gate. I suppose with no past negative experiences in trying an ambitious planetary mission, everyone involved was pretty gung-ho to orbit Venus.

Egad, what if they had tried and succeeded?

Appreciate the update on this, I had never expected to know any more than what I posted about Atlas Able 4. Jane's had put out a reference book in 1987 that had a brief blurb on the mission. They did have a launch photo of Atlas Able 5, too.

Wonder what else they were thinking about back then?