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CNN Live At Daybreak

European Space Controllers Launch Space Probe to Mars

Aired December 19, 2003 - 06:51   ET

THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.

THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.


CAROL LIN, CNN ANCHOR: It's one small step for man and one big step for Europe. In a march toward history, European space controllers launched a space probe to Mars. The mission is Europe's first exploration of signs of life on the red planet.
For more on the mission, we head over to London, where CNN's Gaven Morris brings us the latest from there -- Gaven, have they released the probe yet?

GAVEN MORRIS, CNN CORRESPONDENT: They have, indeed. Just in the last half hour, really, we found out that the probe has released successfully from the mother craft. Now, this is a very historic moment for Europe. It is the first time, really, that Europe have gone so close to Mars and that Britain have attempted to put a craft on another planet.

This was the nervous moment. This was the one they were all worried about because it's a long way to Mars, 250 million miles, and for the last six months, the European Space Agency's Mars Explorer has been making its way there. But the separation, all by remote control from Earth, was a very fraught process. Only in the last few minutes have they got the data through at mission control in Germany that the probe has left the spacecraft successfully and now begins a six day journey to the surface of Mars, where it will open up under its own steam, with some help from electronic signals from Earth, and start digging around in the dirt, taking air samples.

The whole point of this mission is to find any signs of life on Mars, whether they be past or present. Now, obviously, we're not talking green men or monsters. We're talking organisms, particularly new found signs of those types of gases that indicate that once or still some sort of life existed on Mars.

LIN: Gaven, I'm wondering, are the Europeans working at all with the American NASA administration on this project?

MORRIS: It's a good point, Carol, because a lot of people are saying this is a real competition between the Europeans and NASA, because NASA have also a mission to Mars that is due to land on the planet some time very early in the new year, about January 4. Now, they will have two Rovers. They will be able to move around the planet. The European one cannot. And they will be doing a similar thing, doing exercises to see if there are any signs of life.

Now, everybody has been putting this out as some sort of competition, a space race, if you like, the latest leg of the space race. But both sides are saying they are cooperating, they will share the data. The important thing for all of them is to see if they can really prove that there is any signs of former or present life on Mars.

So there will be cooperation, but there is that little bit of pride, I think, that the Europeans have just beaten NASA on this mission -- Carol.

LIN: And, now, Gaven, we really don't know for sure if they're not going to find little green men, now, do we?

MORRIS: Well, we pretty much do, I think. I mean the missions that have been there before, there have been a couple of NASA missions in the past. There was the Viking mission in the late '70s and then the Pathfinder mission last decade. That pretty much ruled out that there are people walking the Earth or there are any sort of civilizations there or any of that sort of thing. And also are the studies that they can do from here.

But what they're really looking for is any signs that something existed, any signs of water or any signs of those gases that show that at some point, whether a long time ago or quite recently, there was something living there. And, if so, that proves that we really are not alone -- Carol.

LIN: Gaven, I was really just kidding.

Thank you very much.

Gaven Morris reporting live from London.

Us wacky Americans.

TO ORDER A VIDEO OF THIS TRANSCRIPT, PLEASE CALL 800-CNN-NEWS OR USE OUR SECURE ONLINE ORDER FORM LOCATED AT www.fdch.com






Aired December 19, 2003 - 06:51   ET
THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
CAROL LIN, CNN ANCHOR: It's one small step for man and one big step for Europe. In a march toward history, European space controllers launched a space probe to Mars. The mission is Europe's first exploration of signs of life on the red planet.
For more on the mission, we head over to London, where CNN's Gaven Morris brings us the latest from there -- Gaven, have they released the probe yet?

GAVEN MORRIS, CNN CORRESPONDENT: They have, indeed. Just in the last half hour, really, we found out that the probe has released successfully from the mother craft. Now, this is a very historic moment for Europe. It is the first time, really, that Europe have gone so close to Mars and that Britain have attempted to put a craft on another planet.

This was the nervous moment. This was the one they were all worried about because it's a long way to Mars, 250 million miles, and for the last six months, the European Space Agency's Mars Explorer has been making its way there. But the separation, all by remote control from Earth, was a very fraught process. Only in the last few minutes have they got the data through at mission control in Germany that the probe has left the spacecraft successfully and now begins a six day journey to the surface of Mars, where it will open up under its own steam, with some help from electronic signals from Earth, and start digging around in the dirt, taking air samples.

The whole point of this mission is to find any signs of life on Mars, whether they be past or present. Now, obviously, we're not talking green men or monsters. We're talking organisms, particularly new found signs of those types of gases that indicate that once or still some sort of life existed on Mars.

LIN: Gaven, I'm wondering, are the Europeans working at all with the American NASA administration on this project?

MORRIS: It's a good point, Carol, because a lot of people are saying this is a real competition between the Europeans and NASA, because NASA have also a mission to Mars that is due to land on the planet some time very early in the new year, about January 4. Now, they will have two Rovers. They will be able to move around the planet. The European one cannot. And they will be doing a similar thing, doing exercises to see if there are any signs of life.

Now, everybody has been putting this out as some sort of competition, a space race, if you like, the latest leg of the space race. But both sides are saying they are cooperating, they will share the data. The important thing for all of them is to see if they can really prove that there is any signs of former or present life on Mars.

So there will be cooperation, but there is that little bit of pride, I think, that the Europeans have just beaten NASA on this mission -- Carol.

LIN: And, now, Gaven, we really don't know for sure if they're not going to find little green men, now, do we?

MORRIS: Well, we pretty much do, I think. I mean the missions that have been there before, there have been a couple of NASA missions in the past. There was the Viking mission in the late '70s and then the Pathfinder mission last decade. That pretty much ruled out that there are people walking the Earth or there are any sort of civilizations there or any of that sort of thing. And also are the studies that they can do from here.

But what they're really looking for is any signs that something existed, any signs of water or any signs of those gases that show that at some point, whether a long time ago or quite recently, there was something living there. And, if so, that proves that we really are not alone -- Carol.

LIN: Gaven, I was really just kidding.

Thank you very much.

Gaven Morris reporting live from London.

Us wacky Americans.

TO ORDER A VIDEO OF THIS TRANSCRIPT, PLEASE CALL 800-CNN-NEWS OR USE OUR SECURE ONLINE ORDER FORM LOCATED AT www.fdch.com