NASA’s Messenger spacecraft flew past the planet nearest the sun in the early morning hours of October 6, completing a critical maneuver to keep it on course to orbit Mercury in 2011 and giving scientists a look at 30 percent of the planet’s surface that no one had seen before.
After more than five months of discovery on the Red Planet, Phoenix succumbs to frigid temperatures, declining daylight and a dust storm on the northern plains of Mars.
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