Nov 30, 2010

Dwayne Brown Headquarters, Washington
202-358-1726 dwayne c brown@nasa gov

Guy Webster Jet Propulsion Laboratory, Pasadena, Calif 818-354-6278 guy webster@jpl nasa gov

RELEASE: 10-315

WEB VIEWERSHIP OF NEW MARS ROVER CONSTRUCTION TOPS MILLION MARK

PASADENA, Calif -- More than one million people watched assembly and testing of NASA's next Mars rover via a live webcam since it went on-line in October

NASA's Mars Science Laboratory, also known as the Curiosity rover, is being tested and assembled in a clean room at the agency's Jet Propulsion Laboratory (JPL) in Pasadena, Calif The webcam, affectionately dubbed "Curiosity Cam" shows engineers and technicians clad in head-to-toe white smocks working on the rover

Metrics from the webcam's hosting platform, Ustream, showed more than one million unique viewers spent more than 400,000 hours watching Curiosity Cam between Oct 21 and Nov 23 There have been more than 2 3 million viewer sessions

The camera is mounted in the viewing gallery of the Spacecraft Assembly Facility at JPL While the gallery is a regular stop on JPL's public tour, Curiosity Cam allows visitors from around the world to see NASA engineers at work without traveling to Pasadena

Viewers from Chile, Japan, Turkey, Spain, Mexico and the United Kingdom have sent good wishes and asked questions in the chat box that accompanies the Curiosity Cam webstream At scheduled times, viewers can interact with each other and JPL staff

The chat schedule is updated weekdays at:

http://www ustream tv/nasajpl

Months of assembly and testing remain before the car-sized rover is ready for launch from Cape Canaveral, Fla The rover and spacecraft components will ship to NASA's Kennedy Space Center in Florida next spring The launch will occur between Nov 25 and Dec 18, 2011 Curiosity will arrive on Mars in August 2012

The rover is one of the most technologically challenging interplanetary missions ever designed Curiosity is engineered to drive longer distances over rougher terrain than previous Mars rovers It will carry a science payload 10 times the mass of instruments on NASA's Spirit and Opportunity rovers

Curiosity will investigate whether the landing region had environments favorable for supporting microbial life It will also look for environments that have been favorable for preserving evidence about whether life existed

Continuous live video of rover construction is available at:

http://www ustream tv/channel/nasajpl

http://www nasa gov/mission_pages/msl/building_curiosity html

http://mars jpl nasa gov/msl/mission/whereistherovernow/

For information and news about Curiosity, visit:

http://www nasa gov/msl

Social media audiences can learn more about the mission on Twitter at and Facebook at:

http://www twitter com/MarsCuriosity

http://www facebook com/MarsCuriosity

-end-

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