It is the year 2006; Mission Control has sent a drone exploration team to the planet Mars. A Mars orbital satellite was launched from Moon Base Alpha. The MOS (Mars Orbital Satellite) has on board, MEL (Mars Exploration Lander). MEL is equipped with a combination landing pod and Launch platform. The Launch platform has a small orbiter rocket on board to return to the MOS and eventually to Earth. Inside the landing pod are four autonomous …showed first 75 words of 451 total…

…showed last 75 words of 451 total…into launch position on the craft. The clock is ticking down. There are 4 Mars Explorer Rovers on board. It will be the job of these four robots to recover samples and bring them back to the module. The launch window for the return craft is critical. This return craft, designed to carry back recovered samples, has room for only one MER. The return of the samples is essential. The return of a MER is secondary.