Welcome to Mars
Woohoo!
After so many disappointments, most recently the failure of Europe’s Beagle, we finally have ourselves another success. The Spirit lander just executed a picture-perfect descent and (as far as we know) landing, everything right on schedule, contact kept with the lander as well as could have possibly been hoped. So now the lander is deflating its crash balloons, resting safely on the ancient river deposits of the Gusev Crater south of Elysium Planitia, and southeast of the Viking 2 landing site at Utopia Planitia. A map showing landing sites can be found here, and an interactive zoom-in map without landing sites labeled is here at the USGS.
Part of a panorama photo could be forthcoming in the next few hours, or perhaps sometime in the next day or so.
Always good to have a billion-dollar success story now and then. And to have that success be in the name of exploration, science, adventure and understanding.
Update:
Photos have been downloading since earlier tonight. Here are a few, which I took the liberty of colorizing:
