From the KSC news webpage "Hot Pics" section:

(04/01/2005) --- KENNEDY SPACE CENTER, FLA. – At the Cape Canaveral Air Force Station Skid Strip, workers prepare the transporter for the Lockheed Martin Atlas V booster segment for the journey to Atlas Space Operations Center. The Atlas V, designated AV-007, is the launch vehicle for the Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter (MRO). The MRO is designed for a series of global mapping, regional survey and targeted observations from a near-polar, low-altitude Mars orbit. These observations will be unprecedented in terms of the spatial resolution and coverage achieved by the orbiter’s instruments as they observe the atmosphere and surface of Mars while probing its shallow subsurface as part of a “follow the water” strategy.

The Centaur upper stage has arrived also.

MRO itself should arrive later this month.

Here is the Lockheed Martin press release.

There is a new short video about the Atlas V and Centaur on the MRO website. About halfway through there is an interesting comparison of the sizes of Odyssey, MGS and MRO.

I'm AMAZED by the Magellan data volume - but to be fair, no interplanetary spacecraft has matched it's data rate ( up to 268.8kbps ) and the first to do so will be MRO

Doug

Having a Voyager antenna and the solar power advantages of Venus orbit were big factors in Magellan's performance, I'd guess.

I suspect it also had a bigger slice of DSN time than most missions get these days, in part due to less competition from other missions.

Just a short update on the Atlas V. The first stage was moved to the Vertical Integration Facility and lifted to the vertical on the 6th of May. The Centaur upper stage was added yesterday, earlier than NASA press releases had suggested. It looks like preparations are going well so far.

Great news for MRO ! I did not know its superiority on data volume compared to previous crafts was so huge

On the side : Gigibits ? What happened to gigabits ? gigi does not mean anything as far as I know

This is a family forum, sir, and any further reference to Gigi's "bits," as you call them, will be most unfavorably viewed...



-the other Doug

Hey how come they cover all the mars mission's HGA's with insulation? They did it to MGS too. Also, I wonder how much data the Telecommunications Orbiter is supposed to send back.

I could be wrong, but it may be because MGS, Odyssey and MRO are all designed to use aerobraking to achieve their final orbital parameters. The concave part of a parabolic antenna makes a really good air brake, something that would probably make the things less controllable during the aerobraking sequences.

-the other Doug