July 15, 1965

On this day in history in 1965 the Mariner 4 passed over Mars and captured the first close-up images of the planet.

Mariner 4

The Mariners

Over the course of 11 years Nasa's Jet Propulsion Laboratory (JPL) designed and built ten spacecrafts named Mariner that were intended to explore the inner solar system. This meant they were primarily intended to visit Venus, Mars and Mercury, which they did. The Mariner space crafts were the first to visit each of the planets.

Each craft were small robotic explorers that launched on an Atlas rocket. Their mission lengths ranged anywhere from just a few months to a year or two. Each craft carried solar panels, pointed toward the sun, and a dish antenna, pointed at Earth. They also carried a set of scientific instruments and a camera.

Mariner 4

A photo of Mars taken from Mariner 4

Mariner 4 was launched. on November 28, 1964 as part of an eight-month voyage to Mars. It reached mars on July 14 the following year and the next day took the first close-up photographs of the planet. While the spacecraft was expected to survive its eight month journey it lasted three years in solar orbit. This allowed the craft to continue long-term studies of the solar wind environment. It was even able to make coordinated measurements with its sister ship, Mariner 5, that launched to visit Venus in 1967.