MARS OR BUST: Latest Mars orbiter, toting powerful instruments, is set for August launch

ONE OF THE LARGEST SPACEcraft ever built to study Mars is set to begin its journey to the Red Planet, where it will look for water, good landing sites, and perhaps even lost spacecraft on the martian surface. Slated for launch on Aug. 10, NASA's Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter (MRO) leaves previous spacecraft in the dust, team members say. Carrying a suite of instruments with much greater resolving power than earlier missions, MRO will be able to pick out 1-meter-sized boulders and narrow crevasses. Its radar camera will look beneath Mars's surface for possible water ice fields detected by the Mars Odyssey orbiter beginning in 2001. It's possible that MRO could also spot NASA's lost Mars Polar Lander , which disappeared during touchdown in 1999. NASA is touting the project as a step toward President George W. Bush's goal of a manned mission to Mars. MRO will spend seven months en route and ...