ITT Industries Deep Space Network (DSN) Operations and Maintenance team successfully supported the Mars Orbit Insertion for one of NASA's newest exploration missions, the Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter (MRO).
With approximately 100 employees at three NASA/Jet Propulsion Laboratory (JPL) locations in California, the ITT team and JPL planned and executed the DSN support strategy using the DSN 70-meter antenna at the Goldstone Deep Space Communications Complex near Barstow, CA, culminating in the spacecraft's successful entry into Mars orbit earlier this month.
The MRO carries instruments for studying Mars to identify water-related deposits, radar to probe for buried ice and water, a weather camera to monitor the planet and an infrared sounder to monitor atmospheric temperatures and the movement of water vapor.
"This spacecraft will return more data than all previous Mars missions combined," said Jim Graf, project manager for Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter at NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory, Pasadena, CA. ITT's DSN team also supports ongoing deep space missions such as the recent Stardust comet spacecraft's return to earth and the Cassini probe's discovery of liquid water on Saturn's moon Enceladus.
"ITT is proud to support the varied missions of NASA's Deep Space Program, which will help to unlock some of the universe's deeply held secrets," said Pete McKinney, president ITT's Systems Division.
