On This Day: Viking 1 Lands on Mars, July 20th, 1976
July 20th, 1976, the first NASA Viking mission to Mars set down in Chryse Planitia and became the first spacecraft to perform a controlled landing on Mars, taking this first picture:
The Viking 1 lander survived on Mars for over 6 years, transmitting hundreds more images from the surface, until it shut down on November 13th, 1982. Three weeks after it touched down, its sister ship Viking 2 joined the first lander on Mars, landing in Utopia Planitia.
One interesting anecdote notes that 22 years later, 2 German scientists calculated that Viking 1 actually landed 4.5 km north east from its previously accepted location.
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Mars: Life Pinned on Viking Horns? (Jun 23, 2003)
Mars: Winds of Change (Jul 12, 2003)
MGS MOC Best Views of Viking Lander 1 and Mars Pathfinder (May 9, 2005)
Viking One (Dec 5, 2006)