Launch of Mars Global Surveyor

Mars Global Surveyor was a NASA orbiter launched on a Delta II rocket. It reached Mars in 1997 and used aerobraking, skimming the upper atmosphere, to settle into a circular mapping orbit. During its mission it mapped the surface in high resolution, measured the planet's topography with a laser altimeter and discovered patches of magnetism in the crust, showing that Mars once had a global magnetic field. Its camera found gullies that suggested liquid water may have flowed on the surface in the recent past and photographed the so-called Face on Mars, showing that it was a natural hill. It also helped select landing sites for later missions. Contact was lost in November 2006, after more than nine years of operation.

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