Mars Surface - NASA's Mars Pathfinder mission landed on the Red Planet on July 4, 1997. It's tiny rover, named Sojourner after abolitionist Sojourner Truth, spent 83 days of a planned seven-day mission exploring the Martian terrain, acquiring images, and taking chemical, atmospheric and other measurements. When the Mars Pathfinder spacecraft approached its destination, no NASA mission had successfully reached Mars in more than 20 years.The final data transmission received from Pathfinder was at 10:23 UTC on September 27, 1997. This image shows the Twin Peaks, which are modest-size hills to the southwest of the Mars Pathfinder landing site. They were discovered on the first panoramas taken by the IMP camera on the July 4, and subsequently identified in Viking Orbiter images taken more than 20 years before.
