Space Probes That Landed On The Surface

Cool Landers And Rovers!

One of the most difficult space exploration missions for scientists to design and execute is to successfully achieve a ‘soft touchdown’ on a distant planet, moon, asteroid or even a comet! Human exploration of the solar system has always valued this achievement, not only because it’s really hard, but because scientists can gather lots more data to study if the probe survives a trip to the surface!

Cool Space Probes Dispatched To The Far Reaches Of The Solar System!

Below are some of mankind’s most successful LANDERS and ROVERS with the future promising more to come!

• Learn about NASA’s first successful lander mission to learn about the lunar surface before the Apollo missions during the various Surveyor probe landings!
• Read Cool New Facts about the Russian Venera Series Of Landers – the first successful soft landings on another Planet!
• The successful NASA Mars landers - Viking 1 & 2 – which gave us our first colour images from the surface of the Red Planet!
• The incredible Pathfinder mission with its adventurous little Sojourner Rover which became the first rover to visit a planet when it rolled off and investigated the rocky plains of Mars!
• Another of NASA’s successful missions to the surface of Mars, learn some Fun Facts About the Spirit Rover!
• A sister ship to the Spirit Rover, the Opportunity Rover far exceeded its planned mission life by thousands of days! Read all about this robust little rover and its never-ending Mars Odyssey!
• Sent as a type of climate station to the northern polar region of Mars, the Phoenix Lander made a successful rocket-powered landing in the cold deserts of Mars.
• One of the most amazing landers in Space Exploration history – The Huygens probe – made a successful landing on the surface of the Saturnian moon Titan! Read all about this fascinating little landers journey to the outer solar system!
• Learn about the Rosetta spacecraft's little lander the Philae probe and its ‘sort-of' successful landing on a comet!
• The Amazing car-sized Curiosity Rover exploring the Martian surface hunting for signs of water or past habitability! Check it out here!
• InSight Mars Lander. Launched in 2018, this little lander has been studying the interior of Mars – be sure to check it out!
• The Mars 2020 Rover. Read about NASA’s next generation nuclear-powered rover which will look for signs of ancient microbial life on Mars throughout the 2020’s!
• Read all about NASA’s futuristic Dragonfly Drone mission to buzz around exploring Saturn's moon Titan!